Endless Pain
by CinnamonRoll13
Summary: Natsume Hyuuga had forgotten what it felt like to have no pain in his body. Each mission he took eat him away physically and mentally. During the hardest times, the girl he loved, Mikan and his best friend, Ruka were there to comfort him. They are his reason to live. But at the same time, they're also the reason why he kept on doing dangerous missions that endangered his life.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Gakuen Alice

**Author's note:** Sorry if my grammar isn't what it's supposed to be because English isn't my first language and this is also my first fanfiction ever. My love for Gakuen Alice finally made me wrote this story. It's also inspired by author HelloDenmark. I really love his fanfics, you guys should check it out too. Please kindly leave your review because it would mean a lot to me. I hope you enjoy the story.

CHAPTER 1

"Natsume!" Mikan ran across the road while shouting for Natsume. It's been one week since she last saw him. Apparently Natsume had been doing his mission continuously without rest, one mission awaits after another. He's just about to head to his dorm after he got off from hospital. He was hospitalized for 2 days. Actually, it should've been longer considering how many wounds he got when he returned to the academy but he refused and ran away as soon as he was able to move. Bandages still cover up all over his body beneath his shirt, hiding countless old scars and new wounds he got from various unimaginable ways. Even now, he can still feel the pain if he move too much and his chest hurts because of his Alice. That's why he decided to stop walking and sat on a nearest bench. That's when Mikan spotted him.

"Where have you been all this time? You didn't attend class the whole week and Ruka said you weren't in your dorm either." Mikan asked worriedly.

Natsume wasn't in the mood to answer her question or to make any excuses so he looked away from her. Of course Mikan was pissed by his behavior, so she grabbed Natsume's head with both hands and she forced him to look at her face. "You shouldn't ignore someone who's talking to you!" She said. Surprisingly Natsume didn't resist at all. Instead he looked straight into her hazel eyes. Eyes filled with dreams and hope, unlike his. At that moment, he prayed those eyes would never lose their light. Mikan enrolled to the Academy just about a year ago and Natsume has been here for three years. That time was enough for him to witness all kinds of darkness the Academy hide and he would do anything to prevent it from tainting the smile of the girl standing in front of him.

"Natsume?" Mikan asked, confused by Natsume's silent reaction. Then she realized something. Her hands that touched Natsume's face were unusually warm. She moved one of them to his forehead and she could feel him burning hot. "Natsume! You have a fever!" She said in a panic. Only then, Natsume quickly brushed her hands away from his face. "It's not a big deal." He said. "My body tends to be warmer than most people because of my Alice. It doesn't mean that I have a fever every time it feels hot."

"But—" Mikan still unconvinced.

"You should stop wasting your time worrying about me and return to the class instead. I'm more worried that you will become more stupid than you are now for skipping class." Natsume mocked.

"What? I'm not stupid!" Mikan shouted angrily. She regretted having been worried so much about him. For Natsume to still be able to make fun of her like this means he must be fine. But just when Natsume was about to stand up, he felt dizzy and suddenly collapsed back into the bench. He covered his painful expression using his hand, afraid that Mikan will see it.

"Natsume! You really are sick." Said Mikan, she tried to lower Natsume's hand down from his face. To her surprise, Natsume suddenly grabbed her wrist with his other hand. "Don't touch me!" He raised his voice. His grip was so tight she frowned, but Natsume didn't realize it. He was too concentrated in suppressing his pain and controlling his expression as relaxed as possible. He let go of Mikan's hand and tried to stand up. This time he managed to do it without falling. Having no strength to say anything, he walked away from her while holding his chest. He wished she would just ignore him and his pathetic condition but he knows it too well that such attitude was not Mikan at all. As expected Mikan ran after him and placed Natsume's arm on her shoulder to support him. "I'll help you to return to your room. And I don't want to hear you say anything to refuse my help. If you still have any strength to do that you better uses it to walk so we can reach your room faster to get you to rest." She insisted.

Natsume realized Mikan was right. For now, it would be better if he let her help so she can leave him faster after knowing that he's alright. Natsume learned from experience that he would never win arguing with this stubborn girl. He tried to walk as fast as he could and keep his body from leaning so much on Mikan's shoulder, partly because he didn't want to burden her so much with his weight and partly because the wounds on his side hurts when he comes in contact with her body. Natsume definitely didn't want to show more wounds he had and make Mikan freaked out more than she already did. He started panting when they reached the building. No one had seen them this far because most students were studying in the class.

When they finally reached Natsume's room, he took out the key from his pocket and gave it to Mikan. Mikan opened the door and quickly she led Natsume to his bed. Natsume groaned when his back touched the mattress. He lied down, staring at Mikan who seemed to look more worried than before. He looked at his shirt, hoping there were no open wounds or visible blood from his body. Thankfully none of that happened. Now he just had to make Mikan leave before the pain hit him again.

"How long do you plan on staring at me like that?" Natsume said. Before seeing Mikan's reaction he turned his back on her. "I'll be fine after sleeping a couple hours. You should leave."

"Are you sure you'll be okay alone?" Mikan was very concerned as she saw that Natsume's face was as pale as sheet. Natsume didn't bother to answer her question. She saw his eyes closed so she decided to leave and told him she would come again after class. As soon as he heard the door closed, Natsume opened his eyes. He sat on his bed and pulled open a drawer beside him. He took out a medical box from there and searched for a roll of bandage. He began unbuttoning his shirt and realized that blood had started to seep in his old bandage. He unwrap his bandage and replaced it with the new one. Among all the wounds on his body, a big deep cut from his upper right chest to his stomach stood out the most. He got it when he was fighting Z's accomplices on his last mission. It was a very unfair fight. Two men using knives surrounded him from both side just when he was already exhausted from using his Alice a lot. The doctor had already stitched the wound close by now but when the painkiller wore off it hurts like hell. After all, he was supposed to still be lying in the hospital so the doctor can monitor his condition closely but he couldn't stand being there. He had been going in and out there so many times that all the staff had already given up on searching for him every time he ran away. They wouldn't even be surprised anymore if he came back the next day with more wounds because it actually happened two or three times already.

In the middle of changing his bandage, Natsume started coughing. At first, it was only a couple of small coughs and he managed to calm down. Then without giving him a break, strong pain struck his chest so bad that he started coughing again. This time it was intense and loud. Blood splattered on his pants before he even got the chance to cover up his mouth. He coughed for a long time. Each time he thought it would be over but it became more intense and lasted until he felt he couldn't take it anymore. It drained out all the energy left from him and by the time his cough finally died down he was more exhausted than before. Tastes of blood remained in his mouth and more spotted on his palm. He panted, concentrating on inhaling and exhaling air until he could breath normally again. He would very much like to slip into unconsciousness right now but he had to finish changing his bandage. He also needs to get a new pant and wash his hands before Mikan came back. Natsume took out two pills from his medical box and swallowed it. After a while, he finally found the strength to get up and do all the things that need to be done.

A couple hours later Mikan knocked on Natsume's door. She waited but there was no answer. She figured that Natsume must be sleeping then. She was about to leave but when she tried to push the door it slid open. Apparently Natsume didn't lock the door after she left. Mikan came in and she found Natsume lying on his bed. He was sleeping soundly. Didn't want to wake him up, Mikan tiptoed while crossing the room until she finally sat on the bed beside Natsume. She stared at the sleeping boy and watched the peaceful expression on his face as if all his burdens were taken away from his body when he was asleep. It looked so different when he was awake. Natsume never said anything about how he felt all this time but ever since Tobita told her about how bad Natsume's condition actually was during the soul shuffle incident, Mikan started to pay more attention towards Natsume and even though he was so good at hiding away everything and acted tough, if you look deeper into those crimson eyes of his you could see the everlasting pain and sadness that's always been there no matter how Mikan tried to erase it. She hoped the time would come when Natsume will be able to smile freely and forget about all his pain and sadness beside when he's asleep.

Mikan put her hand on Natsume's forehead and felt relieved because it seemed that Natsume's fever has gone down. Natsume flinched a little on his sleep just when suddenly someone knocked on the door. Mikan looked at Natsume one last time to make sure he's still sleeping before she went to answer the door. She wondered who might be looking for Natsume at this hour. Could it be Ruka or his other classmates? She didn't tell any one of them about Natsume being sick or that she would visit him after class. She opened the door and frozen on the spot. It was Persona standing in front of her. He frowned when he saw Mikan instead of Natsume. "Where is Natsume?" He asked with his cold voice.

Mikan was shocked at first when she recalled all the terrible things that Persona had done to her and how he tried to harm her friends. This was her first encounter with Persona after the incident in Hanahime den. She managed to snap out of her thoughts when she realized that Persona must've come here to hurt Natsume again. "He…he's asleep." Mikan said.

"Wake him." Persona demanded.

Mikan shook her head. "No. He's in a very bad condition right now. He needs to rest. If you want to talk to him then come back tomorrow." Mikan had no idea where she found the courage to talk to Persona like that, especially because she knew what he's capable of doing. But it became more reasons for her to not let Natsume face him in his current state.

Persona glanced down at Mikan with disgust. "You still haven't learned to shut that little mouth of yours, have you?" Ignoring Mikan, Persona forced his way in to Natsume's bedroom but Mikan stretched out her arms to block Persona. "Move out of my way!" Persona said angrily.

"What do you intend to do to Natsume?" Mikan asked.

Persona stood in silent for a while but then he smirked. "If you really want to know that much then you should come with me."

"What?" Mikan got confused.

"If you come with me I will leave Natsume alone for now. Isn't this what you want?" He smiled slyly.

Mikan knew that she couldn't trust Persona, let alone go with him. Who knows what he might do to her. But if going with him means that Natsume could get the rest he deserved even just for another couple of hours, she's willing to take the risk. She nodded.

Persona's hands were about to reach Mikan's shoulder when suddenly fire appeared out of nowhere and burned his hands. Startled, both of them turned to Natsume who tried to wake up from his bed with his hands supporting his body. He looked very angry and his eyes glared at Persona. Persona shook his hands rapidly trying to put out Natsume's fire. "Don't you dare lay even just a finger on her!" He exclaimed.

Persona was so pissed. He didn't even care about Mikan anymore. "You!" He pointed his finger towards Natsume. "Come with me. Now!" Without waiting for Natsume to move, he went out of the room. Mikan quickly ran to Natsume's side, helping him to get down from the bed. "Natsume! Are you okay?" She asked him.

His body faltered when he stepped on the floor but he quickly regained his balance. "Idiot!" He yelled at Mikan. "Why did you even agree to go with him? Have you forgotten what he had done to you? Do I need to remain your little brain how you were almost dead because of him?"

"I—I was trying to protect you," Mikan stammered, still shook from seeing how angry Natsume was.

"Well, I don't need your protection." Natsume said. "If something likes this ever happen again the first thing you're going to do is to wake me up, understand?" Natsume head to the door and put on his shoes.

"Don't go Natsume." Mikan begged. "You haven't fully recovered yet."

"I have to." Natsume said. "If I don't go now it would just make things worse for later. I cannot avoid him forever, though."

"What does he want with you?"

Natsume didn't show any response. Instead he murmured. "You should leave."

"Wait—"Mikan tried to stop Natsume but it was too late. He already followed Persona down the stairs.

Persona led him to the nearest wood where no one could easily spot them. Then he finally turned around to face Natsume when they reached a small clearing. He walked closer to Natsume until they were only half meter apart. "Show me your wound." Persona said.

Even though he was wearing mask Natsume could still feel the intense glare from Persona's eyes directed at him. He knew that this wouldn't be pretty. Even so, he lifted his shirt showing his body and all the bandages that covered up his wounds. Without warning, Persona punched him so hard on the place right where his biggest wound was. Natsume gasped as he felt the pain throbbing in the pit of his stomach. He curled up his body trying to endure the pain. He could feel his stitched wound opened again and blood flowing out of his body so he pressed his hands against his chest and stomach to stop the bleeding. Persona just watched him as his shirt slowly soaked by blood. "How dare you to use your Alice on me." He said. Natsume gritted his teeth, refusing to make any sound. He didn't want Persona to see how much pain he was in. As if it wasn't enough, Persona began to hit him again numerous times, purposely aiming for his wounds. Natsume fell on his side when he couldn't take any more punch. He took out a healing Alice stone he got from his deceased mother that hung around his neck and grabbed it tightly. Soon the throbbing pain started to ease a little. Persona realized the dimmed light shone from the stone right away and snatched it from Natsume's hand. As soon as he let go of the stone the pain returned.

"You seem to have gotten weak Natsume. Since when you depend on something as tiny as this?" Persona said as he holds the stone between his fingers. Natsume had never used the stone during his mission all this time no matter how badly he was injured. But just now he felt that if he didn't use it he would die from blood loss while Persona just stood there doing nothing.

"Give it back." Natsume let out a voice that sounded more like a whisper.

"And why would I?" Persona said in a sly tone. "Relying on this stone will only make you become vulnerable. Have you forgotten all the training you received Natsume? The situation you're in right now is nothing compared to those." Natsume remembered clearly years of hell disguised as training that he'd been through to shape him into what he is now. It was more like a torture to him. He had almost died several times and he couldn't even rest at night because sometimes Persona would sneak into his room tried to attack him in his sleep. Of course he's always careful not to kill his pet cat but he never let the negligence shown by Natsume off without any consequences. One time he snuck on the exhausted Natsume who was asleep after returning from his mission and injected a poison in his body. It made him suffer the whole night before Persona finally gave the antidote in the morning. After that he never really sleep for about a month, afraid that the same attack would happen again.

Persona dropped the Alice stone from his hand and stepped on it until it was smashed to pieces. "No!" Natsume stared at the remnants of the stone. He tried to gather them but Persona stepped on his hand. He groaned. "Come on, Natsume. Don't be such a crybaby now." He said as he took out a brown envelope from his jacket and threw it on the ground beside Natsume. "That is your next mission. The principal ordered you to leave tomorrow night. I want you to meet me here by then."

Natsume knew he should just keep quiet and do as Persona said but he can't help not to open his mouth. "From how you punched me just now it's gonna be a miracle if I can come back here tomorrow night, let alone do a mission." He murmured.

He was ready to accept Persona's anger but instead Persona just smiled. "It seems you have a girlfriend and friends that care so much about you Natsume. If you don't want to, I'm sure they will gladly replace you on this mission. Even though they're not as good as you in combat, I can still find a perfect role for them in the upcoming mission. Even anchovies can be useful as bait, right?"

"I swear I'll kill you if you touch anyone of them!" Natsume kneeled, his eyes burned with rage. This isn't the first time Persona threatened him this way and every time he always ends up following his orders because of this. He's willing to sacrifice himself as long as his other friends didn't sink into the same darkness he was in. None of his friends knew about this. Not even Ruka. Natsume never told him because he knew Ruka would blame himself greatly for everything that had happened to him. Persona raised his hand and smacked Natsume across his cheek. Natsume turned his face to the side in shocked.

"Then stop complaining about your mission." Persona said as he turned his back. "I'll go straight to your friends if you don't show up by that time."

Natsume watched as Persona walked deeper into the forest until he couldn't see him anymore. Then he tried to stand up but fell again on his knees. His hands were getting colder and black dots started to appear on his sight. He steadied his breath for a couple minutes before finally he took the brown envelope from the ground and braced himself to start walking. After what seem like forever, he arrived in front of his room. He opened the door and spotted Mikan sitting on his bed. Mikan rushed to Natsume as soon as she saw him. "Natsume!" It didn't take long for Mikan to realize the blood that soaked on all over his shirt and on his hands. Her eyes grew wide in shock when he saw Natsume's painful face. "He did this to you?" She asked.

Natsume leaned on the wall. "No… The wound was already there before. Thanks to him now it's open again." Mikan helped Natsume to get to his bed and laid him down. He unbuttoned Natsume's shirt and began unwrapping the bandage full of blood on his body. Unknowingly to her, her hands trembled as she began to see all the wounds on Natsume's body. The large cut across his body looked so terrible that she almost looked away from it. There were also old scars behind the new one. Soon, tears began to fall from her cheeks. Natsume felt Mikan's trembling hands and opened his eyes. He saw the expression he didn't want to see the most from the girl he loved and it hurt him more than any pain on his body. That's why all these years he had learned to conceal his pain, so that the burden would be his alone to bear. He wanted to wipe away all the tears from Mikan's face but realized that he would just stain it more because of the blood on his hands, so he just stared silently at her. She was like the sun he could never be able to reach without also plunging her into darkness. Mikan's gaze moved from the wounds to his eyes. "How did you get all these wounds?" She asked.

Natsume averted his eyes from Mikan's. "You wouldn't want to know the detail."

"Of course I would!" Mikan shouted. "How long have you been suffering like this? Why have you never told anyone of us? Aren't we your friends?"

Natsume sighed. "Most of them are from the mission that was assigned to us students from Dangerous Ability Class. The wounds I got from my last mission weren't so bad, if only Persona would leave them to heal before he decided to channel his anger on me. Not like this is the first time he did it though."

Mikan's feelings were mixed up. How could Natsume talked about it so easily like it was not a big deal at all? She couldn't imagine that Natsume actually had been through something worse than this before. "I'll take you to the hospital." She said.

"No," Natsume said quickly. "Please, just help me clean my wounds and put another bandage on top of them."

"But—" Mikan protested.

"I know my body."He stated. "This kind of injury won't make me die. I'll be fine by morning."

Mikan was confused why Natsume treated the big deep cut full of blood on his body like it's just some kind of scratch wounds. His face already looked better now even though she hasn't done anything to treat his wounds. Was he used to this kind of pain that it didn't even bother him so much anymore? Why was he different from the other students? What was this school even thinking to send an elementary kid like him on a dangerous life threatening missions? She wished that she could do something to prevent Natsume from risking his life again in the future but it's just impossible. That's just how things have been going on for years on this academy. They can only endure it until they graduate from here. Mikan wished that time would come sooner. Right now all she could do was just treating Natsume's wounds. He hissed a few times when Mikan's hand got to close to his wounds. It's all cleaned up now and didn't look as terrible as before. Finally Mikan finished wrapping the bandage all around Natsume' body. It was a bit messy as she had never done something like this before but Natsume didn't complain. She hand over a new shirt for him to wear and Natsume looked relieved when he didn't have to move his body so much anymore and could really get some rest.

"Hey," Mikan said. Natsume opened his eyes. "Do you mind if I stay here for tonight? I mean, in case your wounds got worse or you have a fever because of it. I don't think that I'll be able to sleep either if I leave you like this."

"Are you jinxing me?" Natsume said with his usual grumpy expression.

"Eh? No, no. That's not what I meant." Mikan said in panic.

"Do as you wish." He said before closing his eyes again.

Mikan smiled. "Thank you Natsume. I promise that I won't disturb you on your sleep. You won't even notice I'm here."


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

Natsume woke up in the middle of the night with a strong tightness sensation in his chest. He holds his chest firmly while trying to catch his breath. It hurts when he tried to inhale and it seemed that no air had entered his lungs. After a couple seconds he started panicking. His breathing became shorter and he opened his mouth trying to breathe in more air, but the more he tried the stronger the pain in his chest become. He felt like there was an iron fist gripping his chest. He clenched his fists and shut his eyes, recalling the words the doctor used to say to calm him down when he had this same kind of attack in the hospital before. _You have to keep breathing, Natsume. No matter how painful it is. Do it slowly, follow the rhythm. Don't breathe using your mouth; you already have the perfect tool for it. Your nose and lungs are functioning normally; you only have to make them work. Don't let the pain take over your mind. That's it._

His breathing gradually became more stable. He regained control of his body again even though his chest still hurts but it didn't suffocate him anymore. Natsume opened his eyes and looked at his surroundings. He was in his room and it was pitched black but he realized a figure lying beside him who was Mikan. He was startled at first but then remembered it was him who let Mikan spent a night in his room. Still, he didn't expect Mikan would sleep so close beside him on his bed. Now, he has to creep on his bed carefully without waking her and took the pills made for his Alice before the next wave of pain struck him again.

He has been through this many times that he knew this night wasn't just going to end smoothly with him returning to bed and fell asleep until morning. This was going to be another sleepless night for him. The pills helped relieving the pain to the extent that he could endure but not eliminating it. Sometimes he thought he should just take sleeping pills or anything that could make him lose consciousness in an instant instead but Persona won't allow him because it would be bad for the missions if Natsume become addicted to it. Somehow Persona knew every time Natsume used it and he would get punishment from him the next morning.

Natsume gulped the pills and got off his bed to get some water. He limped into the kitchen. Yes, special star students got kitchen in their room. He took out a glass from the cupboard and started filling it with water. Before he had a chance to drink it, the pain in his chest was suddenly getting stronger. He couldn't help but started coughing. _Not so soon please_, he thought. But his body didn't listen to his will, it never did. Natsume hurriedly put the glass full of water he was holding on the kitchen table and used his sleeve to cover his mouth, hoping that it could muffle the coughing sound. It started out quietly but became more and more violent. When it didn't show any sign of stopping, he unconsciously reached inside his shirt, wanted to pull out the Healing stone that would always relieve him when things like this happened but nothing was there. He realized that Persona had destroyed the stone back in the woods.

_That Fucking Persona –_ he thought.

Natsume didn't have time to think about the stone when his cough became more intense. He couldn't hold it back any longer so he rushed to the bathroom and locked himself. On his way there, he took a look at Mikan and thanking God she wasn't awake from all the noise he caused. She probably would if Natsume kept on coughing like this so that's why he decided to go to the place where his sound would be unheard by her. He sat on the closet; struggling and trying hard to convince his body that this one cough would be the last and acted normally as if it was over, but a moment later it started again. He felt that it lasted longer tonight and usually it only became like this if his body was really worn out after a fight. This time it's not because of that but the inability to use his healing stone that caused him to suffer more.

When it was finally over, his whole body trembled and he felt dizzy. He breathed heavily while trying to gather all the strength left to keep his consciousness. He didn't want to faint in a place like this. At least he should use his last strength to return to bed. He wiped the blood on the side of his mouth and unlocked the bathroom door. When he stood up he looked at the mirror and stared at the reflection of himself, a boy that looked very much like a living dead. His face was extremely pale, with thick dark circles under his eyes and very messy hair. On top of that were his tired lifeless eyes staring blankly into the mirror. He didn't know he looked so pathetic. No wonder Mikan was very worried about him.

Natsume hated his life. In fact, he had lost the meaning of life or the reasons to keep on fighting a long time ago since he came to this academy. He was treated no more than a tool for the school's sake and no one could help him. Even when the teachers knew his Alice was the fourth type all of them just turned a blind eye and pretended they didn't know anything. It's not entirely their fault because Natsume himself knows very well they wouldn't be able to do anything even if they wanted to. On the contrary, it would just make things worse.

Among the worst days when he got beaten up so bad the thought of just lying on the ground and let himself bleed to death tempted him so much because even if he got up and got his wounds treated he would eventually returned to the same condition or even worse. So what's the point to keep on fighting? Tomorrow will never get better. Dark clouds will never turn to rainbow. No light will be waiting at the edge of darkness. He just waited for death to come by keep on doing more and more dangerous missions. The day when he would never open his eyes again and not feeling anymore pain sounds better than this living hell. That's the reason why he acted like a jerk in front of everyone. He didn't want to get attached to anybody that Persona could use to threaten him. He didn't want anybody to cry or be sad for him when he finally face the unavoidable death. Ruka was an exception though. If only he knew things would turn out like this he would've done everything he could to prohibit him from coming here.

Now, the thought of giving up his life didn't seem to linger so much on his mind anymore. It was since a certain pig tail brown-haired girl came into his life. At first he hated her naive and cheerful attitude which was the opposite of him and thus he teased her a lot, expecting the girl would cry like most people and never talk to him again. But the next day, she always greeted him with the same big smile like the sunshine, which, much to his surprise, illuminating the darkness in his heart little by little. It didn't feel so lonely again every time he closed his eyes at night or when he was forced to do a mission, the image of her smile appeared in his mind, becoming a reason for him to survive one more day so he could see her smile longer. Of course the little girl hasn't realized how much she meant to him. Natsume never showed his true feelings to her after all.

Natsume returned to his bed silently. He stared at Mikan's innocent face, wanted to remember every detail of her; the long brown hair that hung on both sides of her head, featuring her heart-shaped face, her fringes that split in the middle above the long lashes and her small nose, everything looked perfect to him. That night, he didn't take his eyes off of her at all for he would be going back on another mission tomorrow night and with this almost broken body, he did not have the confidence of returning alive this time. Unlike before, the thought of death feared him.

He saw Mikan's face suddenly shriveled and she moved as if she's having a bad dream. She murmured something slowly. Natsume leaned in closer to her. "Me…Natsu...me." Mikan said. His eyes widened in surprise when he heard Mikan mentioned his name. A second later, he was able to guess what kind of nightmare she's having. He moved closer toward her and hugged her tight. This position made his wound hurt but he didn't care. It's so warm. The warmth he hadn't felt in years. He wished they could stay like this forever. His hand on her back trembled while holding someone so precious to him. Someone that would turn his world upside down and broke him completely if he happens to lose her. "Shh..." He whispered. "I'll definitely protect you."_—even if it means I have to die. _He added in his thought.

When Mikan woke up the next morning, Natsume had already gone. There're blood stains and a roll of bandage on the side of the bed where he slept. Mikan figured he must've changed his own bandage before he left. She had a strange feeling last night, as if someone comforted and talked to her when she was having a nightmare. But it certainly can't be Natsume, can it? She shook her head to get rid of the thought. She wondered where Natsume went so early in the morning. Hopefully he doesn't push himself too much. Mikan turned her head towards the clock on the table and realized it's already 9 a.m. Her eyes grew wide. "Aahh. I'm late!" She screamed.

She quickly jump out of bed and rushed to her own room to get dressed. It's Sunday and she had no school today but she promised her classmates the day before that they would go to Central Town to buy presents and decorations for Natsume's birthday party. Yes, today is his birthday and they planned to give him a surprise party like they did each year. Actually, it shouldn't be a surprise anymore by now because they always do it on the same date every year but it's Natsume we're talking about. He always seems to forget his own birthday until they remind him and looks like it's the same for this year too. Mikan ran to the bus stop where she supposed to meet her friends. By the time she got there, all of them had already gathered, waiting for her.

"Sorry I'm late." She apologized while trying to catch her breath.

"Where have you been?" Permy stepped out of the crowd. "We almost missed the bus because of you."

"I overslept last night." She hesitantly confessed.

"You what?" Permy said angrily.

"Hey, hey. It's alright now." Tobita interceded. "Mikan-chan's already here, right?"

"Thank you Iinchou." Mikan said, she hid behind Tobita's back to avoid Permy's sharp gaze.

A moment later, all of them were already on the bus. They were all chattering happily and discussing their plan for tonight. Koko and Anna will be on guard outside Natsume's room while the rest of them will decorate and arrange the gifts and cakes they prepared for him. Mikan had already imagined about all the howalons she's going to buy at Central Town. It's been a long time since she ate them. She was grinning the whole time thinking about it.

"Hey, Mikan. Do you already know what you're going to buy for Natsume this year?" Kitsumine asked her suddenly. "You know, since you got the trophy as the present which Natsume disliked the most last year." He laughed. It's true that she lost the bet they made on Natsume's birthday last year and as the result she became Youichi and Ruka's slave.

"Geez,I'll definitely give him something better this year." She said.

The moment they arrived at Central Town, everyone separated their own way to buy the things they're assigned to and looked for their own present. Mikan was with Hotaru and Ruka. They had to buy colored papers and birthday hats for everyone. Because today's Sunday, the Central Town was more crowded than usual. They also spotted a lot of middle and high school students from the Academy. The queue for Howalon was already snaking so as soon as they finished buying all the things, Mikan immediately joined the queue. Hotaru and Ruka followed behind her.

"Ne, you guys can go ahead to look for Natsume's present without me. I'll catch up after buying the howalon." Mikan suggested.

Hotaru shook her head. "No need to. I already have a perfect present that I'm going to give him."

"Eehh." Mikan said in disbelief. "You're so fast. What is it Hotaru? Tell me, tell me."

Hotaru grinned. "Well, since he always seems to be bothered by a certain stupid noisy girl, I planned to give him one of my inventions. Sleeping bag caterpillar No 2—once you get inside no noise from outside would be heard, even the sound of an explosion. You also won't feel a single thing even though the bag is being kicked, rolled around or fallen from height, and it can't be destroyed from outside." She explained.

"It sounds very useful," Mikan said. "But, hey! Is it me that you called stupid noisy girl?"

Hotaru gave her a cool gaze. "Who else? Baka."

"You're so mean, Hotaruu." She whined. "Ruka-pyon, what about you?"

"Well, I've also bought mine already." Ruka said calmly.

"What? Don't tell me that I'm the only one who still have no idea about what kind of present to give to Natsume." she sulked. It's not like she hasn't think about it until now. She was thinking hard on what Natsume would like to have as a gift when she saw him looking sick on the bench yesterday. All the events that happened after that made her completely forgot about the present. She sighed. It's already 1 p.m. and if she really wanted to find a present for Natsume by the end of the day she needs to hurry. It took them about an hour before Mikan finally got her howalon. Then they began searching on every shop they could find; clothing store, gift shop, accessories, snack shop and even the store where all things were made using Alice, but none of them was enough to be a present for Natsume. Being a special star, he could easily purchase all the things he wanted and it made all the things sold in here not special anymore. Hotaru had already left them half the way to enjoy her bubble tea on a café while Mikan had almost given up. Her legs ached from walking all day and they have to return to the Academy in half an hour. She sighed and sat on a chair on the side of the road to rest her foot.

"Don't give up Sakura." Ruka tried to cheer her up. "I'm sure we can find it if we keep looking."

"Thank you Ruka-pyon." She said. "Come to think of it, Ruka-pyon, you haven't told me what present that you're going to give to Natsume, have you?"

Ruka hesitated for a moment. "Well, I'm going to give him a necklace."

"Necklace?" Mikan looked interested.

"Yeah, not just an ordinary necklace though. It was the one made specially to attach Alice stones. I also attached a few stones that I collected from our classmates and my own Alice. I really want to support Natsume by giving something that might help him, being his strength, even just a little bit. That's why I decided to give him this."

Mikan's eyes sparkled. "That's an amazing gift Ruka-pyon. Natsume would certainly really like it. Giving something that might be a strength to him…I hadn't thought about it that way before." Mikan silenced for a while, the smile on her face grew wider and wider. "I think I know what to give him as a present. Come on Ruka-pyon. We have to return to the Academy right now."

Back at the Academy, everyone was so busy preparing for tonight's party. Their job was easier because Natsume still hadn't returned to the dorm yet, but they still need to work as fast as possible or their plan will be ruined. Everyone already had their own jobs and most of them hardly noticed when Mikan slipped away from the room after she finished hanging a birthday sign on the wall. Half an hour later, she returned with a beautifully wrapped gift box tied with orange ribbon and a small paper written 'From Mikan' in her hand. She grinned broadly, unable to wait for Natsume to open it. When she put her present on the big table in the middle of the room alongside other gifts from her classmates, Anna and Nonoko approached her.

"It's such a beautiful box, Mikan-chan." Nonoko started. It made her flattered.

"Hehe. Yours look amazing too." She pointed at a medium-sized yellow box with green ribbon on top and a red gift bag that both of her friends held in their hands.

"What's in there, Mikan-chan?" Anna added.

"Well, it's a se-cret." She laughed.

The door swung open and Tsubasa and Misaki entered the room. They too, got a present in their hands for Natsume. "Hi everyone!" Tsubasa greeted them.

"Tsubasa-senpai! Misaki-senpai!" Mikan ran across the room towards them. Then she jumped to Tsubasa. "I haven't seen you in a while senpai." She hugged Tsubasa tightly. Tsubasa just laughed cheerfully but Misaki looked at them with a sad expression in her face because Mikan still didn't know that Tsubasa was transferred to the Dangerous Ability Class. Everyone in Special Ability Class had agreed not to tell her about this.

"Is there anything that you guys want me to help?" Tsubasa said after he put Mikan down.

Tobita shook his head. "We've done pretty much everything in here. Now, we only need to wait until Natsume come to give him the surprise." He handed a birthday hat to Tsubasa and Misaki.

"Wow, you guys sure are fast." Tsubasa looked around.

"It should've been faster if not because of a slacker who left her work to get a present when she already got the whole day to look for it." Hotaru quipped from behind them. They all laughed while Mikan felt embarrased.

"Ne, you guys better get ready." Permy interrupted. "My lovely Natsume-kun can come anytime know."

"Ah, it's right, Permy." Mikan said. "What you got as a present for Natsume this year?"

Permy gave them an expected cocky laugh. "My gift this year would definitely be Natsume's favourite. Ta-da!" She took out a shirt from her bag. It was a white T-shirt with Natsume's face printed in the middle. "This is a couple shirt. The one that I'm going to give to Natsume had my face printed on it. That way, whenever he wears it he would always remember me." They all laughed nervously with sweat running down the side of their head while Permy had already drowned on her own imagination. Some guys immediately thought that they were lucky it wasn't them who received the present.

The clock ticked and soon it was already 7 p.m. but Natsume still hasn't returned yet. After half an hour, Mikan started to worry. _It's Sunday._ _What he might have been doing to be so busy and not even returning to his own room?—_she tried to shake off the thought that Natsume had fainted somewhere because of his injuries. She paced back and forth until Hotaru shot her with her Baka-gun.

"What was that for, Hotaru?" She cried.

"You're annoying me."Hotaru said with a mouth full of cake. Just now she decided that she couldn't wait any longer and started to eat all the cupcakes on the table.

The rest of her friends sat on the floor and some rounded the kitchen table; drinking juice, playing cards or just chatting with each other. Mikan decided to sit down too before she got hit by another shot from Hotaru's Baka-gun. Two hours later some of them were already fallen asleep. Tsubasa and Misaki had already returned to their own dorm in middle school section because students were not allowed to wander off their dorm building after past nine. Nobody seemed to really worry about Natsume not coming back, maybe because this isn't the first time he did this. But what they didn't know was how badly Natsume was injured the night before.

After past ten, Youichi said goodbye to them and went back to his room along with some other students. An hour later, Mikan, Ruka, Hotaru, Permy and Tobita were the only one left in the room. Ruka suggested that they should return to their room too. "Make sure that Natsume-kun gets my present okay?" Permy said before she left. Tobita yawned and decided to head off with her and Hotaru followed them from behind.

"Sakura, why don't you go back too? You must be tired." Ruka said.

"What about you Ruka-pyon?"

"I'm going to sleep here and wait for Natsume to return."

"Then let me sleep here with you." Mikan said bluntly. Ruka's cheek blushed because of it. He still loved Mikan even though he knew that his best friend also had the same feeling towards her.

"Eh, emm, I don't mean it that way." Mikan said quickly after seeing Ruka's red face. "I just want to wait for Natsume with you."

Ruka smiled softly. "Yes, I know Sakura. You're worried about Natsume too. That's why, leave it to me. I promise to call you right away if anything happens to him okay?"

Mikan finally nodded and return to her room, leaving Ruka alone in Natsume's big special star room.

Meanwhile, a person was seen limping outside near the Academy gate. Trace of blood trailing behind him. His expression was unreadable because of the cat mask that he put on. When he finally reached the gate he climbed to get inside and dropped himself among the bushes on the other side. His eyelids felt so heavy, forcing him to close his eyes. The weather was cold tonight, but sweat trickled down his face. He stared at the moon that shone brightly above. But, no matter how bright the moon was, it rays could not reach into his shattered heart. All he saw was only the never ending darkness.

**Author's Note: **Chapter two is finished~ Please let me know what you think and I will post chapter 3 sooner if many of you are asking about it. Thank you for reading my story.


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

Natsume slowly opened his eyes. At the same time, pain returned to his body. He just came back from his mission and barely made it to the Academy alive. It was already past midnight and he fainted for about twenty minutes. The gunshot wound on his left arm was still dripping with blood and it seemed he had broken a few ribs. He tore his sleeve and tied it to his arm to stop the bleeding. He was lucky because the bullet fired by his enemies missed and only managed to graze his skin, or else he would already be dead from blood loss by now. His mind still loomed about the inhumane mission that he was forced to do and his hands shook greatly at the thought.

His mission was to get a blueprint that contained a plan to invade the Academy from the Anti Alice Organization (AAO). The blueprint was located in an orphanage, hidden by members of AAO that disguised themselves as the caretaker there. He had to steal it before it was sent to the organization's headquarter tomorrow morning. They got all those information from an Alice Academy spy that infiltrated AAO so it was definitely trustworthy.

Natsume met Persona at the designated place. He was with someone Natsume had never seen before. "You showed up in time." Persona said. "This is Ryu. He has a barrier Alice and will be helping you on tonight's mission."

Ryu was about fifteen years old. He had a black raven hair and big dark eyes. He wore two earrings on both side of his ears, alice restrains, which means he must be pretty strong. He smiled at him and reached out to shake Natsume's hand. "Nice to meet you, Natsume-kun. I've heard a lot about you" Natsume ignored him and turned to Persona. "Let's get on with the mission already."

Soon, they arrived at the site. The orphanage was located in a remote area, so there were no other houses or buildings around. Such a perfect place for AAO's undercover operation. It was very quiet. All the children of the orphanage must have already fallen asleep. Natsume's job was to sneak in and searched for the blueprint which most likely to be hidden inside the caretaker's office. Persona pointed to the far left room on the second floor. Natsume nodded. He must enter alone while Persona and Ryu were going to watch from a safe distance and helped him with Ryu's barrier if needed. It was easy for Natsume to sneak in unnoticeably. He didn't even make any sound at all when he climbed the nearest tree and landed on the roof. He pulled out a thin wire from his pocket and stuck it in the keyhole to unlock one of the windows on the second floor and threw himself in.

He arrived at a dark narrow corridor and started walking towards the office. His eyes adjusted to the darkness quickly and he paid attention to even the slightest movement around him. Unlike the others, a door on his right that was slightly open caught his attention and he peered inside. Apparently it was the place where all the orphanage children slept. He counted there were about twenty children sleeping soundly on their beds. Some of them were only three to four years old, the same age as Youichi, while the oldest seemed to be around the same age as him. The adults must be sleeping somewhere else.

He left them and kept walking to the far end room on the corridor. He used the same method to unlock the door and as soon as it swung opened he quickly hid himself behind the leaf-door to make sure everything was safe before he walked inside. Without wasting any time, Natsume began searching everywhere for the blueprint. He had been careful not to leave a single trace or anything that could make the enemy realized this place had been searched. He was expert in this. Then, before he found the blueprint all of a sudden a sound of something being thrown on the floor broke the silence and the door behind him slammed shut. His mind worked quickly. He dropped all the paper he was holding and hid himself behind a desk while using his sleeve to cover up his nose. Smoke started to emit from a small ball that rolled to the middle of the room and filled the air.

_Damn, it's a trap!—_He thought. He should've noticed earlier when it became too easy for him to get here. Natsume held his breath. When he heard something being thrown into the room he knew it was either a bomb or smoke ball, but he learned from all his missions that AAO wouldn't explode their hideouts just for a single enemy, especially in this kind of place where there were a lot of children, so he made a bet that it was only a smoke ball that probably filled with sleeping gas and he was right. He would've been dead if it was a bomb.

Before he could take any action, the door slammed open again. It's hard to see through all the smokes but he saw about five or six men wearing gas masks barged in, ready to ambush him. Each of them armed with a gun and they began firing at him. Natsume was cornered. The only way out was blocked by two men and it's going to be hard to dodge all the bullets and pass through them even with his Alice. He needed to take advantage of the situation while the room was still filled with smoke and escape from there. He rolled out of his hiding place and formed a wall of fire to block his enemies. Then he lifted the nearest chair and threw it straight to the window, making the glass shattered all over. Even if they couldn't see him, the bullets fired at him still hadn't stopped. Most of them missed the target but suddenly Natsume felt a burning sensation on his arm and it began to bleed. He clamped his mouth shut, and without looking down he jumped from the window.

He landed hard on the ground. There were no bushes or other plants around to support his body when he descended so he fell straight and landed on his side. His whole body was screaming with pain. It felt as if all the bones in his body had been crushed but he ignored it. The pain was more excruciating when he tried to stand up but there was no time to rest because his pursuers could catch up to him anytime soon. Without looking back, Natsume ran as fast as he could and made his way back into the forest where his allies had waited. He panted hard and unable to speak for a while after he got there.

"Where is the blueprint?" Persona asked.

"I don't have it… It was an ambush." Natsume said breathlessly. "They knew that we're going after it."

"Useless." Persona muttered then he nodded to Ryu, who effortlessly climbed up a tree beside them. Then, Ryu stretched out his hand towards Natsume and helped him up the tree. Natsume's body stiffened when he pushed himself to get to the upper branch. His shirt was drenched with sweat and blood. He leaned against the trunk.

"You seem pretty beaten up, Natsume-kun." Ryu said with a smile on his face.

"Shut up." Natsume replied.

"How many enemies were inside?" Persona asked. He had already standing beside them on the same branch.

"Six. Could be more."

"Good. Now that Ryu has his barrier around the house they surely won't be able to escape using teleportation."Natsume turned his head towards the orphanage and noticed a semi-transparent barrier that covered the entire area. "Now, Natsume. I have one last task for you. If you can do it properly, I'll cancel the punishment for your failure on retrieving the blueprint."

"Just say it quickly." He grunted.

Persona looked at him with cold eyes. "There's only one way to make sure that the blueprint won't fall into enemies' hand. I want you to burn down this place into ashes."

Natsume's eyes grew wide in shock. "What?" He asked one more time, unable to believe what he just heard.

"I know it's going to be hard to use your Alice inside the barrier with your current condition. But for you it's not impossible, is it?" Persona responded calmly.

"It's not that!" He raised his voice. "A lot of innocent children are sleeping right now inside the house and you told me to burn them all? For God's sake, are you out of your mind?" He couldn't contain his anger anymore.

"Since when you started questioning my orders, Natsume?" Persona looked irritated. "How come you're trying to protect a bunch of orphan kids that you don't even know? Those kids might be innocent right now but give them six or seven years and they'll turn into one of those terrorists that will become a threat to the Academy. Why do you think AAO made this place their hideouts? I've taught you not to show any mercy. It's even better if we can wipe them altogether right now." He bent down and pulled Natsume's hair. "Now that you know, work your stupid brain and do as I say or your friends will die instead of them."

Natsume fell silent. _This isn't right_.—He repeated it over and over in his head. Those children didn't know anything. They're just the same as him, being brought up to become someone else's pawn and do their dirty jobs. But as much as he wanted to he couldn't defy Persona. He got his friends as hostages and Natsume couldn't afford to lose someone precious to him anymore. He clenched his fist and stared at the peaceful orphanage. It reminded him of their family house with his father and Aoi, the only time he ever felt so happy. That, until the Academy pulled off their dirty tricks and even got the whole village burned down just to get him enrolled. Since that incident, he has always been in their grasp.

With a sigh of breathe, he locked up all his emotion and fire began to lit inside the house.

It started on the second floor, right in the room where he jumped off and spread fast to the other room. Natsume had to try twice as hard to keep the fire lit because of the barrier. He almost collapsed from all the efforts but then he heard someone screamed from inside which completely woke him up. The scream was followed by another as fire mercilessly reached every area of the building. Thick black smoke rose into the night sky only to be held back by the barrier and returned to the ground. Soon, the orphanage was engulfed with flames. Some children managed to get out and run away from the fire but they couldn't pass through the barrier and gathered at the edge of it, watching in horror as their house lit in crimson red flames and begged to be saved. It was only a matter of time until fire reached them or they could also die sooner from suffocation due to inhaling smokes. There was no sign of AAO member outside the building.

"Oi," Natsume called Ryu. He pointed at the side of the barrier which children gathered the most. "Can you loosen your barrier over there? Just for a short time until all the children escaped."

"Ah, as much as I want to unfortunately it's not possible Natsume-kun."Ryu smiled again. "You see, if I loosen just one part of my barrier and someone passes through it no doubt the other parts would be affected too, and it's going to take a couple minutes before I can stabilize them. During those periods of time, I can't guarantee that our enemies won't find their way to escape from here. But, you really are kind Natsume-kun. If I were you, I would be thinking about my own condition right now instead of them. You're almost at your limit, right?"

"Tch. If you can't do it, just shut your mouth and stop showing that fake smile of yours to me." Natsume was pissed but Ryu only laughed at him.

Suddenly, a silhouette of a human figure stormed out of the burning house. His body was engulfed in flames. From his posture they could tell it was one of the children. He screamed in intense agony that tore the silence of the night as he writhed on the ground in pain. His shrieked became even more when he begged for help, for anything that could end his sufferings. The rest of the children looked at him in terror and some even cried out his name but nothing they could do but watched their friend being burned alive and slowly dying in an excruciatingly painful death. After a couple minutes, the blood-curling scream stopped as he lied unmoving on the ground. Panic spread through the crowd and they desperately began hitting the barrier with their hands or whatever things they could find nearby. They choked and coughed and cried as the merciless fires crept toward them.

Natsume could no more stand to watch the slaughter in front of his eyes, so he exerted his power to absorb the fires around the orphanage children. It took him a great effort especially inside the barrier where he almost had no control of his Alice, but he did it despite knowing the damage this action would cause on his body. He knew that he'd be able to endure it; he'd live, while these children would certainly die if he did nothing. The orphanage children weren't so panicked anymore when they realized the fire had stopped spreading but many of them were still suffocated from lack of air. Natsume breathed heavily and he felt liquid running from his nostrils.

"Natsume-kun! What are you doing?" Ryu looked at him in surprise. "Your nose is bleeding! Stop it!"

"No!"He exclaimed. "I'm not a murderer like you! Don't… tell me what to do."

"You can't—"

"Stop, Natsume."Persona spoke in a cold icy tone that was enough to send chills down his spine. For a brief moment Natsume couldn't think. His mind flooded with fear in front of the person who abused him all these years and his sub-conscious mind screamed in his head, told him to obey this man's order for his own safety. "Burn those children with your fire or I'll kill your friends." Persona's voice echoed in his head. He closed his ears, not wanting to hear anymore. The pain, the scream, the pressure became too much for him.

He ran away.

And now he's back in the Academy. Wounded, but survived. His body felt completely numb from lying on a cold hard ground for such a long time. A groaned escaped from his mouth when he shifted from his position. His breathing was quick and shallow because every breath he took feels like a knife being stabbed over and over into his chest. It hurt. So much that he felt like using his Alice to burn away all his injures. Standing up was a big task to him; his legs almost unable to support his weight. He didn't know where to go. He couldn't go to the hospital or back to his room; those were the first place Persona would search to find him. He sighed. Why should he care about him? It wasn't the first time he tried to run away from punishments, and no matter where he hid in the end he only managed to delay them.

He noticed someone was standing in his way back to the dorm. It was Rui Amane, his fellow classmates from Dangerous Ability Class. Natsume saw him as a freak that only interested in guys. Of all people why is he here? He walked closer towards Natsume. "Seems like you got yourself in trouble again Natsume." Rui greeted. Natsume turned away from him and started walking again to a different direction, completely ignoring the guy.

"Hey, hey," He said in high-pitched girlish tone. "Who says you can ignore me? I'm your senior you know."

"I don't have time to deal with your crap."He halted when Rui moved to block his path. He glared at him. "What do you want?"

"Deliver a message." He changed his tone and sounded serious this time. "_4 a.m. Northern woods. Be there or I'll drag you myself."_Natsume frowned. He knew exactly who sent the massage. "Did you fail on a mission again Natsume? Geez, you should already know by now not to let your soft side get to you. That weakness of yours might kill you someday. I'm telling you this as your senior. For people like us, we don't have a choice but to live under the principal's order. Even among the Alice's students, they treat us like a monster, so don't ever dream of living like normal people."

"Don't think of me the same as you." Natsume got provoked.

"Right, you think you got friends huh? Let's see if they still consider you as their friend if they know what kind of missions you have been doing." Natsume wanted to punch him but Rui easily caught his hand. "You think that living here is like hell, but it's actually not so bad if you stop resisting. Persona didn't even have to threaten me or Hayate to carry out our missions. You're by far the most rebellious student of DA class, Natsume."

"Let me go!" Natsume pushed his hand away from Rui's grip. "Save the talk. I'm not in the mood to hear it right now." He slipped his hands inside his pockets, but before he could walk further Rui handed him a yellow colored pill. "What is it?" He asked.

"A drug to keep you awake for at least eight hours. His order. You really pissed him off, didn't you?" There was a slight sympathy in his last sentence.

Without saying anything Natsume snatched the pill from Rui's hand and gulped it. The pill was meant as one of his punishment, meaning that he wouldn't be able to sleep or be unconscious and his mind would stay clear enough to feel all the pain in his body. Very typical kind of torture from that man.

Natsume decided to return to his room and found it full of festive decorations; multi-colored balloons floated on each side of the room, streamers hung from the ceiling, a big banner was draped on one side of the wall, and the words "Happy Birthday" printed on it. He was confused to see all the things that made his room looked so alive until he realized today was 27th of November, his birthday. Apparently, his friends had thrown him a birthday party and he missed it. It's not like he was into this kind of thing but seeing all that now left out and empty he felt… sad.

At first he thought the idea of celebrating his birthday every year was childish and such a waste of time but actually it's a good way to remind him that he's alive. That he survived one more year. Who knows if this year might be his last. Besides, it seems that that stupid Mikan really liked this kind of party. It wasn't so bad because she would smile and laugh a lot too on the occasion.

Without turning on the light, he went to the kitchen to have some water and discovered a two layered birthday cake covered with brown and white icing sat on the kitchen table surrounded by other smaller cupcakes. He plucked the number-shaped candle on top that was never lit and played it with his hand.

_Twelve huh?—_He thought to himself. _Eight more years until graduation. If I can make it._ Doubts about being able to live freely outside the Academy someday haunted him as his condition became worse with each passing day. He used his Alice to light the candle in his hand and blew it after. _Congratulations on surviving another year of hell, Natsume. Brace yourself for many more to come._

As soon as that, his head started to pound. Losing his balance, he dropped the candle to hold on to the nearest chair just in time before strength left his feet. He kneeled down and took a deep breath but immediately regretting it. The stabbing pain from his broken ribs was unbearable and he choked on his own breath. Hand clutching his chest, he started coughing harder and harder each time until his body shook from the violent coughing fit. Tears formed in his eyes and the familiar taste of blood lingered in his mouth. —_Damn, I can't take it anymore. Am I going to die?_

Ruka opened his eyes as he heard strange noises coming from the kitchen. It seemed that he fell asleep on Natsume's bed while waiting for him. When he got out of the bed, he heard the sound of sharp inhale and someone's coughing again. "Oh, no." He hurried himself to the kitchen and found his best friend lying on the ground, gasping for air.

"Natsume! What happened to you?" He rushed to his side.

"Shouldn't have… used my Alice… to light the candle." There was pain in his voice.

"Don't talk anymore!" Ruka panicked. "I'm sorry. Sorry Natsume. I'm sorry I fell asleep. I should've tended your injuries the moment you returned." He grabbed Natsume's non-bleeding arm and put it on his shoulder to help him stand up, then laid him on his bed. Natsume's eyes closed. His eyebrows furrowed in pain. "Natsume! Please stay awake. What should I do?"

Natsume slowly opened his eyes. "My medicine… Ruka." His weak finger pointed at a box on top of the drawer. Ruka grabbed it and gave it to Natsume. He took out two tablets and two pills from inside the box and swallowed it all at once. The tablets were painkillers while the pills were meant for his Alice. Soon the pain began to subside as the medicine worked its way in his body.

Ruka went to the bathroom and came back with water and clean cloth. He began to wipe away the blood on Natsume's arm that flinched every time Ruka touched his wounds. Then Natsume coughed again but luckily no blood this time. Seeing his best friend in such a state Ruka's eyes began to tear up. "You have been doing your mission again right, Natsume?" Natsume nodded slightly. "Why? Even on your birthday. Why you have to..." His voice trembled.

"Don't cry."

"You could've been killed!"

"But as you can see I'm still alive. It's alright Ruka."

"No, it's not. You were never alright all this time but you're just so good at hiding away your pain. I thought that I'll become your burden so I pretended not to know everything you decided not to tell me, about the missions, your Alice type, everything. But I was wrong. The moment I decided to follow you to this Academy I swore to myself to always be by your side and fight alongside you, but in the end I am the one who's always being protected by you." He sobbed. "Our friendship doesn't work that way, Natsume. Please let me take part in your sadness and worry. Don't make me feel left alone anymore."

Natsume stared at the ceiling in silent. He didn't know what to say. He never opened up to anybody before. He felt vulnerable, more than ever. "I… can't" were the only words he was able to let out from his mouth. "I, I'm sorry Ruka. It's just… I know how it feels like to be trapped and have no way of going back. You don't know what I had done with my own hands, how I hurt people with my Alice. I don't want you to start hating yourself like me. Please, the only thing I'm able to protect by sacrificing my own life until now, don't let it all be for nothing."

Ruka wiped away the tears from his face. Crying wouldn't solve anything. Natsume should be the one who cried, not him. "I understand, Natsume. But I don't want any secret between us from now on. Can you at least promise me that?"

"If that's what you want."

Finally Ruka finished wrapping a bandage around Natsume's arm and he moved towards his bloodied shirt. Natsume stopped him before Ruka touched his body. "It's fine Natsume. Let me check your wounds." With hesitation Natsume let go of his hand and Ruka started to unbutton his shirt. By the time he was done, a surprised look was shown in his face. A part of Natsume's chest was swollen, and there were cuts and bruises all over his body, along with bandages that was already wet with blood hiding the rest of the scars. He felt painful just by looking at it. How could one endure so much pain? "A-are you sure we shouldn't go to the hospital, Natsume? Your wounds could get infected if not being treated properly."

"No." He answered firmly. "He asked me to meet him again in the Northern Woods in two hours. I won't be able to be there if I go to the hospital."

"Him?"

"Persona."

"What does he want with you?"

Natsume hesitated to answer but decided not to lie to his friend anymore. "I ran away in the middle of my mission, so he's probably pissed about it. Don't worry. He won't kill me or got me beaten up more than I already am. He wants me to be fit to do another mission as soon as possible." Even so, there's no way Persona would call him just to talk, but Natsume kept the thought to himself.

"Still, I'm worried about you Natsume. Can you not go, just for this time? I'll call Narumi-sensei or whoever that might be able to help us."

"They can't." Natsume interrupted. "You know they can't go against the principal. Otherwise, no student will have to suffer like me." Ruka looked at him with a sad expression. Being too long in despair, Natsume must have already given up seeking help from others. "I'm telling you this because you told me not to keep any secret from you. So in return, Ruka, I wish you to respect whatever decision I made regarding my life."

Ruka didn't say anything. He just treated Natsume's wounds in silent, and Natsume also considered his quietness as approval. He looked to another direction and stiffened up when Ruka pressed his wounds with cloth that had been poured with disinfectant, his hands turned white from grabbing the mattress so hard. Trying to divert his mind from the pain, a stack of unopened presents at the corner of the room caught his attention.

"Those are…" He began to say.

Ruka turned his back. "Those are birthday gifts from our classmates. Even Tsubasa and Misaki senpai came to bring you presents."

"I see." He said quietly. –_So that shadow guy has returned from his mission too. Just in time before Mikan would start to make a fuss about his whereabouts. _"So, which one is yours?" Natsume coughed. "And stupid polka's?"

"Oh, wait a second. I'll get it for you." Ruka took a rectangle shape box from the lower stack and quickly found the blue box tied with orange ribbons which was Mikan's because he actually had been paying attention when the girls talked about their gifts before and brought them back to Natsume. "Since it's already past midnight, I know it's too late now but I want to say happy twelfth birthday, Natsume." He smiled and handed two gifts into Natsume's hand.

Natsume opened the rectangle shape box and found a beautiful necklace with five stones of different colors hung on it. "It's from me." Ruka explained. "The Alice stones are Alices from some of our classmates and mine. I really hope you can find it useful even just a little since I won't be able to be there to help you when you're on a mission."

"Yeah, thank you Ruka." Natsume said gently. He put down the necklace on the bed beside him and turned to open Mikan's present this time. It was another Alice stones. The first one was smaller with mandarin orange color which was unmistakably Mikan's Alice stone, and the other one was bigger and had a beautiful light blue color. Ruka had never seen it but Natsume's eyes became wide as he realized the stone right away because he used to have one, the color was perfectly the same as the one he always hung on his neck. "That girl… how could she know?" Natsume muttered. He held the blue stone and it started glow.

"What is it, Natsume?"

"This stone, it's a healing stone Ruka. I used to have one but I lost it." He recalled when Persona crushed his Alice stone. "She knew I was injured, but I can't believe she got me this."

"Could it be that she asked Imai's brother to make it?" Ruka said in amazement. He knew Mikan decided her present in the last minute and it certainly wasn't easy to run to the High school Department and search for Subaru-senpai because he was a very busy person as the Executive Committee Vice Chairman.

Natsume grasped the stone tighter and he could feel warmth coming out from it. Slowly, color returned to his face and he could feel the smaller wounds beginning to close. His left arm stop bleeding and his bruises disappear. Soon he already felt a lot better. He noticed a small paper on top of Mikan's gift box and opened it.

_Get well soon, Natsume. From Mikan._

For the first time in a long time, a slight smile appeared on his face. _Thank you_—He repeated the words in his mind. Natsume added the two stones to the necklace and put it on, and then he tried to wake up from his bed. "I'm going to the bathroom to change my clothes, Ruka. Thank you for treating my wounds."

"Do you want me to help?"

"I'll be fine." He said before he walked to the bathroom.

After Natsume had done changing, he got out of the bathroom but Ruka was nowhere to be seen. He peeked into the kitchen but it was empty. "Ruka?" He called. No answer. Instead he found a letter sitting on top of his bed. He quickly grabbed it and unfolded the paper. It was Ruka's handwriting and seemed to be written in a hurry.

_ Natsume, you told me earlier to respect your decision and you know I always do. But for this time, I hope you can respect the choice that I made too. After being quiet for a long time, this is something I decided to do as your friend because I don't want to see you suffer anymore. I'm going to replace you to meet with Persona. It's okay. As you said before, he won't kill a student. So for the meantime I want you to not worry about me and rest your body instead. I'll send somebody to check your condition tomorrow morning.—your best friend, Ruka._

"No… No,no,no." Natsume's eyes widened in horror as his biggest fear finally happened. He raced to the door and found it locked. "Shit." He searched for his key but couldn't find it anywhere. Ruka must have taken it from his clothes when he treated his wounds earlier. He returned to the door. "Ruka! Ruka open the door!" He banged and kicked hard on the door numerous times, ignoring the pain that started to arise from the movement.

"Don't go Ruka! If you're still out there, please, I beg you! It's too dangerous! You have no idea what he's capable of—"He coughed. "Ru—" Natsume wasn't able to finish his sentence as another coughing fit took hold of him. It hurt more because he tried to talk rather than gasping for air during each break.

"Don't…go…" He weakly hit on the door one more time with shaking hands in a futile attempt to save his friend from facing the most cold-hearted and dangerous man in the academy.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: **Hi guys, thanks for all the reviews. It really keeps me going. I try to write and post updates as soon as I can. While uploading this chapter I'm already working on the third page of the next one, so YAY me! Let me know what you think about this story. Enjoy :)

CHAPTER 4

Ruka had been friends with Natsume for a long time. He was his first real friend in fact, while the other children on his previous school only got near him because of his Alice and family wealth. He was tired of them. He was tired of being followed by his family guards even inside the class and then locked up at home for the rest of the day. He knew that his mother did it for his own sake because he would be forced to leave his family if the Academy found him, moreover with the kidnappings that happened to him two times already, those were enough to convince his family to never take their eyes off of him. As his family's only child, Ruka could buy anything he wanted but for a boy at his age, freedom was all he yearned for.

Only when Natsume transferred to his school, Ruka's world started to change. Natsume was an Alice too like him yet he lived so freely. It didn't take long for them to become friends. It never got boring when Natsume was around. They're the same age but Natsume was so strong and Ruka admired him. When Natsume was set up and forced to enroll to the Academy, Ruka just couldn't leave him alone. This time, it's his turn to become his strength.

Three years now in the Academy, they made a vow to graduate together someday. But day by day, he witnessed as Natsume's light has been put out little by little. He became a loner and pushed everyone away. His eyes grew darker, and sometimes he even called himself a murderer. He tried to act tough and all but he wasn't always so strong. Even after all he'd been through, deep down inside he's only a nine year old boy, lost and afraid. One night he felt so guilty and slit his own wrist using kitchen knife, saying over and over that he didn't deserve to live after what he had done, before Ruka stopped him. That was during their first year here, the hardest time when a lot of senior students talked behind his back and spread false rumor about him being a killer and arsonist.

What was even more stressing for Ruka was that he couldn't do anything but watched as Natsume suffer in silent. Natsume strictly told him to stay away but to what purpose? He'd rather get hurt than seeing people took advantage of his power and made him do things he hated the most that it broke him from inside. Natsume's body wouldn't be able to take more than this. His sufferings were more than enough for a lifetime. It needs to end, somehow.

Ruka had made up his mind that night. He took a deep breath. The door behind him was banging loud and he heard Natsume's desperate voice, shouting his name and told him to open the door but he couldn't turn back anymore. When he heard him coughed he was worried sick but quickly assuring himself that Natsume would be safe inside his room. He headed to the girls' dorm and stopped at a one-star room belonged to Mikan Sakura. He slipped a letter, along with Natsume's key room under the door, hoping she would notice it tomorrow morning and check on Natsume.

Mikan was the only one Ruka could trust and even the first person to be told about his and Natsume's past. Since she came, a lot of things have changed. Everyone seemed to be carried away by her undying cheerful attitude and optimism that was rare in this Academy and she slowly changed the people around her. That includes him and even a cold stubborn jerk (yes, he admitted that his friend acted way too far in front of other people sometimes) like Natsume Hyuuga fell for her. But once again, he was just too stubborn to admit it. It brought him to the thought of taking the opportunity to steal Mikan away from him but he knew Natsume needed Mikan more than anything, like a person who clung to his only light inside the sea of darkness; he'd be lost without her. That's why Ruka was willing to throw away his feelings if it's for Natsume.

Ruka sneaked past the nanny robot and went to the Northern Woods. It was a creepy place at night but Ruka felt a little at ease because a few of his animal friends showed up looking curious at him and some even followed him from a safe distance. He gently told them all to go away, even when his bunny jumped onto his lap he put it down asked them to not follow him, as he couldn't risk them getting hurt by Persona. Ruka continued deeper into the forest. He used to walk with determination, but fear crept over him quickly as he was getting closer. He couldn't back down now. Natsume bravely faced this man so many times already and he surely could do it too.

He reached into a clearing and found Persona leaning against a tree with folded arms and mask put on. An expression of amusement appeared on his face when he saw Ruka. Getting over his fear, Ruka tried to move his stiff legs towards Persona but still careful not to get too close.

"A kid like you shouldn't be here." Persona spoke in a menacing tone.

Ruka fought the urge to run from Persona. His mind raced about their encounter at the Hanahime den. _Get a grip, Ruka_. _Natsume needs you_–He told to himself. "I, I came here in Natsume's place."

Persona smirked. "Ha. That brat must have reached his limit and finally threw away his friends. I knew this would happen sooner or later."

"Natsume would never do something like that!" Ruka denied. "I came here on my own will."

Persona glared at him. "To be honest, I don't care about your reason. In fact, I'm sick of your shitty friendship. That Natsume too, always blabbers about killing me if I touch any of his precious friends. That's why I kept oppressing him. I want to see how long his determination will last."

Ruka frowned, clearly unhappy with how Persona talked about Natsume. "Stop treating Natsume like he's one of your toys. What did he ever do wrong to you?"

"Wrong?" Persona moved closer. "A naïve kid like you wouldn't understand. This world does not revolve based on what's right or wrong. The only thing that matters is who has the power to control the people below them, taking advantages and make use of that person to get what they want. Whether you like it or not, we all live up to that rule. I'm only using my full authority as the person in charge of Natsume to discipline a problematic student like him. 'No one' ever questioned my way." He meant his last sentence as a warning.

"Discipline? You sent him on missions that made him come back covered in blood almost every time. You forced him to use his Alice even though you know it was eating away his life. Natsume is my friend. I won't let you do that to him anymore. Do you know how many times he ended up in the hospital?"

"Of course I know. I was the one who made him got sent straight there a couple times, after all." He laughed cunningly.

"Wha–?" Ruka couldn't believe that the man in front of him was also one of the teachers. He's definitely insane. An abuser. He treated human beings no more than a toy that can be replaced if it's broken. Without realizing it, Ruka took a step back away from Persona.

Sensing his fear, Persona smiled. "Afraid now? You talked big since earlier." He looked at Ruka, who stared back at him as best as he could "Fine. If you're that determined to save him, show me the friendship or whatever trash that you were talking about."

"What do you mean?"

"Not so bright for a three star student, are you?" Persona purposely brought up about his star ranking which he didn't earn by himself, but from Natsume's sacrifice. "Isn't the reason you came here is to ask me to stop sending Natsume on a mission?" Ruka nodded. "Normally I'd be punishing a foolish act like yours by making you take over his mission but let's make this more interesting. I'll make a deal with you. If you're able to do it, I promise to never send Natsume on a mission again."

"What kind of deal?" Ruka carefully asked. He already had a bad feeling about this.

"You know what my Alice can do right?" Ruka still remembered clearly about Persona's Alice, the Mark of Death, which could rot everything he touched and how it almost killed Mikan too. "Now, no matter how but if you can survive after being touched by my Alice I'll release Natsume from Dangerous Ability Class. That way he might be able to live his little life longer. What do you think? If you really want to save him then it's not an opportunity to be missed right?"

Ruka was shocked hearing Persona's words. Did he really intend to get him killed? Was he playing with his emotions? Almost nobody had ever survived from the deadly touch that'd spread rapidly throughout its victim's body, decaying it. Once you got it, it's like a death sentence had been handed down to you. He knew from the start that Ruka wouldn't accept this deal. He just offered it to show how pathetic he was and that the 'willing to die for him' kind of friendship never really existed. But he was wrong. If it was Natsume, he'd gladly accept it. In fact, he'd been fighting with his whole life for him. And so Ruka would be no different. Even if it seemed impossible, even if there's only a slight chance that he could do something to free Natsume from the hell hole he's been crawling then it definitely worth the risk. "If I accept it, how can I know that you won't lie to me about freeing Natsume?"

"Oh, don't worry. I always keep my promise." He said. "So are you going to accept it? I don't have all day to wait."

Ruka gathered all the courage inside him and poured it into words, hoping that it wouldn't be a decision he'd regret. "I-I accept it."

Persona looked a little surprised with Ruka's decision, but he immediately turned it into a grin like a child who just got a new toy to play with. "Good. You're braver than I thought." He said.

Ruka looked away, didn't want to give Persona the satisfaction of noticing the fear that started to arise in him. "Ju—just make sure you keep your promise." He could feel his stomach was in knots. Now it's either Natsume would finally be free or he'd die in vain instead.

Persona took off the mask from his face, pure black eyes staring at his victim's. "It's a deal then." He stretched out his hand. "Give me your arm."

Ruka hesitantly raised his left arm up in the air. He closed his eyes in fear when Persona's cold finger touched him. It stung. Ruka winced and tried to pull his hand away but it was too late. Persona wouldn't let go of him until black marks started to appear on his upper arm, creating a searing pain that shot through his hand. Ruka had never felt something like this before, as if life was being drained out of him through the black marks that continued to spread. His breathing became uneven. He tried to keep standing on his feet and bear the pain. When Persona let go of his arm, the pain dimmed but Ruka immediately fell to the ground. His whole left hand felt cold, like blood had stopped flowing inside.

"I can't wait to see how you're going to survive, little boy." He put his mask back on and sauntered away from that place without even once glancing back.

The alarm clock rang loudly, breaking the silence of that morning. Mikan turned around to continue her sleep, completely ignoring the sound, but the clock didn't give up and started to move with its short legs. It hopped to Mikan's head and started pulling her hair. Mikan shrieked. "Stop! Stop pulling my hair! I'm awake now, okay?" Mikan reached a button behind the clock and pushed it. "I hate this clock." She complained. The clock was one of Hotaru's inventions, given to her after being late for class five times in a month. But as much as she hated it she could never throw away Hotaru's gift.

She stretched her arms and opened the curtains, welcoming the morning sun as usual with a smile on her face. It felt good because waking up so early, she didn't have to rush getting ready for school like she usually did. She rubbed her eyes and walked to the bathroom but a strange paper lying near the door caught her attention. It wasn't there last night. Mikan took the paper and suddenly a key slid down from it. There was writing inside.

_Sakura, I apologize for not speaking to you directly and sent this letter instead because I don't want to disturb your sleep. Natsume came back last night. I treated his wounds so he should be fine by now. On your way to school, can you stop by Natsume's room and check on him? I slipped his room key along with this letter. Thank you—Ruka._

"Ruka-pyon?" Mikan got confused. Why was Natsume's room key with him? Why bother slipping it inside her room in the middle of the night? But as dull as Mikan she couldn't connect the dots so she decided to just get ready and come to Natsume's room as soon as possible.

She walked the corridor to the boys' dorm with anxiety. The thought that something bad might have happened to Natsume made her speed up her steps while her hand held tightly the key to his room. She went out very early so there were still no other students in sight. Soon Mikan arrived in front of Natsume's room and unlocked it. Before she could do anything else, the door was pushed open hard that it hit her nose. "Ruka?" Natsume called.

"Ow, Natsume. Look what you have done to my nose!" Mikan protested.

Natsume was still in his pajamas. He was drenched in sweat and there was dry blood remaining at the tip of his mouth. Worry could be seen clearly on his face. As soon as he realized it wasn't Ruka who opened the door he gritted his teeth and stormed out of there, leaving Mikan who watched him in shocked. He didn't even bother to wear any shoes.

"Natsume where are you going? I'm talking to you, you know!" She yelled.

Natsume didn't have time to deal with the noisy Polka Dots who kept yelling behind him. All his thoughts were focused on Ruka. He could never forgive himself if something happened to him. _Please be safe—_He repeated in his mind. Natsume ran across the field straight to the woods. Twigs and roots scraped his bare feet as he ran but he only accelerated his pace. He stumbled once and quickly got up, leaving mud and dirt on his pajamas. When he arrived at the place, it was empty. No sign of Ruka or Persona there. "Ruka!" He began to shout. His dried throat hurt because of it. "Ruka answer me!" He searched the surrounding area, behind every trees, every bush and crevice but Ruka was nowhere to be seen.

Panic coursed through him. He felt like rock had been placed in his stomach. No time to waste, he started running again. This time he headed to the teacher's office. No matter how, he'd be sure to make Persona spit the truth out of his mouth. Natsume didn't even care when other students looked at him weirdly. He was running like crazy as if Ruka's life depended on the time he spent to find him. He slammed the door of the office and stopped in front to catch his breath, eyes scanning sharply inside the room and found Persona sitting on his desk at the corner. Other teachers were surprised to see him as he made his way towards Persona.

"Where is Ruka?" Natsume glared fiercely at Persona who remained calm.

"Who's that?" Persona said. "Rather than that, barging in with no manners like this into the teacher's office, you're really asking for punishment, aren't you Natsume?"

"Don't play fool with me." He urged. "He went to the woods to meet with you last night."

"Oh, you mean the animal-lover boy who always follows you around?" Persona pretended to recall. "I don't know. I just left him in the woods last night."

"What? What have you done to him?" Natsume raised his voice that the whole room could hear their conversation. "Answer me you bastard!"

"Behave, Natsume! Or you know the consequences won't be pretty." He threatened.

"I don't care about your punishment! Beat me all you want! Just tell me where Ruka is."

Persona refused to open his mouth. Fine. If talking didn't work, the only way to force him was by using his Alice. Natsume was just about to push his fire out when somebody grabbed his back from behind. Letting his instinct took over; he elbowed the person and jerked away from his grasp. Turned out it was Narumi, who quickly grabbed him by his collar and landed a kiss on his cheek. Natsume's body heated up and he felt weak at the moment. He lost consciousness.

Natsume woke up at the scent of something very familiar to him that he knew right away where he was before opening his eyes. The beeping sound from his heart rate measurer and the smells of medicine filled the air. He opened his eyes and found his cat mask had been put on him. That explained the headache he'd felt since earlier. His chest still hurt and he couldn't move freely because both his hands were cuffed to the bed. Well, at least he was taken to the hospital instead of the punishment cells after the commotion he had caused earlier.

"Are you awake Natsume?" A familiar voice spoke to him.

"I'll kill you." He turned his head to face Narumi who stood not far from the bed.

"My, my. As blunt as ever, aren't you?" Narumi said. "If I didn't stop you back there what do you think would've happened? You wouldn't be lying here healing all your wounds now." As much as Natsume hated him he knew Narumi was right. "Putting on your restraint and handcuffed you are as far as how I can minimize your punishment, Natsume. You know, after you passed out that guy insisted that you be handed over to him because you humiliated him in front of all the teachers."

"Then you should've saved the effort to bring me here and let him take me instead. I still need to get answers out of his mouth."

"I heard your conversation earlier. If it's about Ruka Nogi, I can tell you where he is but under one condition. Tell me everything that happened last night."

"You know where Ruka is? Is he alright?"

"I'll tell you after you told me what I want to know."

Natsume began to tell Narumi about how Ruka treated his wounds last night and decided on his own to confront Persona by locking him inside without mentioning the detail of his mission as they were forbidden to talk about it. "Now tell me where he is."

Narumi stood in silence for a moment. "If what you said is true, then I guess everything he mumbled before he lost consciousness make sense."

"What do you mean?" Natsume stiffened.

"This morning I was walking in the Northern Woods when I heard someone moaned. I found Ruka lying on the ground with his whole left hands covered in bruises from Persona's alice. Before he passed out, he told me about some kind of deal he made with Persona. He said he needed to survive his Alice in order to free you from DA, something like that."

"He did what?" Natsume shocked. Of all people, Ruka should know very well how cunning and cruel Persona was. What did he even think to make such a deal with him? Couldn't he see it was a trap set for both of them? There's no way Persona would ever release him from DA. Letting Ruka to meet him in the first place was already a mistake and now his life is on the line because of it. If only he hadn't told Ruka about his appointment last night, this would never happen. Natsume quickly learned from this to never ever again share to anybody (especially the likes of Ruka and Mikan) about the upcoming misfortunes that might befall to him. Even though he had to keep the bitter truth to himself, it's pointless beside making them worry and doing stupid things. "Where is he?" For the umpteenth time today he asked.

"Of course I rushed him to the hospital." Narumi finally answered.

Natsume wanted to jump from the bed as soon as he heard that and run to Ruka but just as he started to move the cuff held him down. "Uncuff my hands and let me see him." He had no choice but to beg to Narumi.

"Now, now Natsume. Please calm down." Narumi raised his hands with palms up. "We already gave him full treatment as necessary and tried to heal him as best as we could. I assure you Ruka is in good hands so there's no need to be over-worried. In fact he's a lot better now."

Natsume knew that Narumi lied to him. That man has never been a good liar. Ruka's illness wasn't just a disease that could be cured with ordinary treatment. Even the healing Alice couldn't do much to take away the marks that were rotting his body. "He's still dying, isn't he? Let me see him." He asked one more time, making it as clear as a warning.

"Unfortunately Natsume, you need to remain here at least until the end of the day. In the mean time you're forbidden to leave, not just because of the punishment but also for your own health. Your body too, is in a very bad condition. You have a fever. Your stitched wound was opened. Three of your ribs were broken and almost punctured your lung. Why didn't you come to the hospital sooner?"

"Stop acting like you care." Natsume turned his back but unable to do it fully because of the cuff. He was too tired to argue. If Narumi planned to keep him here he'd just find another way to escape. This wasn't the first time they tied him to the hospital bed anyway.

"I'm not, Natsume." Narumi looked at him with pity in his eyes. Natsume hated when people did that to him. "I'll come back again tonight to free you and take you to see Ruka. Before that, please don't run away from here. If Persona sees you not in the hospital, he'll drag you to the cells and you will certainly be prohibited from visiting Ruka or even go anywhere near his room. Is that clear?"

Natsume nodded. He didn't have any choice now. He heard Narumi walked out the door and left him alone. He glanced at the clock to see that it's still 10 a.m. Gosh he hated waiting. His mind wondered about Ruka. He could probably be lying on the room next to him. They were so close but he's unable to see him. He felt useless. Even so, the fact that Ruka agreed to such a deal with Persona just for his sake touched him. He knew Ruka was a loyal one but to endanger his life for him was a different story. Natsume swore he was going to kill Persona if something happen to Ruka.

Between times, a few nurses came to his room to monitor his blood pressure and took a sample of his blood to be tested. Then a doctor came to prescribe him medicines which sadly had to be administered using injections because the restraining mask he was wearing made him unable to put anything through his mouth. They told him about his condition thoroughly- it's worsen as expected- but none of them said anything when he asked about Ruka's. Maybe even if he's lying on his death bed they still wouldn't open their mouth. Natsume refused when they offered him a sleeping drug to help ease his pain. As tired as he was he kept his eyes and ears open for any news about Ruka.

After what felt like forever he noticed Narumi finally came. "I was starting to think that you're going to let me rot in here."

Narumi used the key in his hands and began to uncuff Natsume. Then he removed the mask from his face. Natsume immediately got up and forcefully ripped the IV catheter out of his left hand. It bled but he felt free the thing was no longer stuck in his hand. "God can't you wait? I was just about to help you to take it off." Narumi complained.

"Don't make such a fuss about it. I did this all the time." Being an escapee, Natsume even learned how to remove the ECG from his body. He cleaned the blood on his hand using tissue. "Let's go." He looked at Narumi who was still staring at the blood that dripped into the bed.

Narumi guided him to a room on the third floor where Hotaru's brother, Subaru welcomed them in. Natsume's eyes immediately fixed on Ruka who was lying unconscious on the bed. He approached him. Ruka's face was pale. He seemed to be troubled breathing as his chest roughly moved up and down. He had an oxygen mask put around his face. Natsume pulled his blanket to reveal bruises that covered his entire left hand, up to his shoulder. Natsume clenched his fists as his anger and hatred towards Persona rises upon seeing his best friend in the brink of death.

"His condition still hasn't changed." Subaru announced. "I managed to slow down the decaying on his body with my Alice, but without completely took away the marks from his body, it's only a matter of time before it reaches his heart. Even now, he has a difficulty breathing because it has started to spread to his lungs."

"What should we do?" Natsume asked. He still hadn't turned his gaze from Ruka.

Nobody answered. But then Subaru, feeling responsible as a doctor took a step forward and touched Natsume's shoulder. "I'm afraid nothing more than we have done can help him. This is a rare case and as I've said before even though I used to be one of the victims I merely survived because of the healing Alice that miraculously cured my body from the inside. Right now, we can only trust Ruka's will in surviving and pray that a miracle will happen."

Natsume grabbed Subaru by his collar. "Miracle? Stop fucking kidding me! You're a doctor, aren't you? How can you say such irresponsible thing?" Natsume have had enough. He was sick of it. He couldn't do anything to protect his sister when they made her Alice went out of control, resulting the loss of her eyesight and memories. Even his mother got killed because she rebelled against the academy. Now he was told to just stand by and watch while his only friend, Ruka was dying from trying to save him. It's just unfair. People around him got hurt all the time. He wished to just disappear, and he'd be sure to take that evil corrupted bastard Kuonji down with him.

"Stop it, Natsume!" Narumi shouted. Natsume of course, didn't listen. He was tired of having people ordered him what to do and what not. This time he'd do what he wanted. Narumi quickly grabbed his shoulder to separate him from Subaru who was already choking. "This is why I hesitated to bring you here. If you keep making a racket, I have no choice but to call the security to send you out." Natsume stopped resisting.

"Wait," Subaru said all of a sudden. "Isn't there recently another victim who survived Persona's Alice? A girl named Mikan Sakura."

They all looked at each other. It was true that Mikan cured herself from Persona's Alice by using her own Stealing Alice to absorb all of them and turned it into Alice stones. That's how she survived. But since that incident they agreed not to talk about what happened and Mikan herself still didn't know about her own ability. They all kept it a secret in order to protect her. If anyone, right now it was only her ability that could save Ruka's life.

"No." Narumi interrupted. "Whatever the reason, we can't ask Mikan to use her Stealing Alice. This is what they want. The whole incident is a trap set by the Elementary School Principal. He knew we'd have no other choice but to depend on Mikan's ability to cure Ruka. If he survived because of her Alice, Persona might keep his promise and release you Natsume, because they've gained a much more valuable asset."

Natsume shuddered at Narumi's words. If they ask Mikan to absorb Persona's Alice from Ruka's body, she would be forced to take his place and join the Dangerous Ability. She'd be in Kuonji's care, who would exploit her Alice to carry out his evil plan and even hurt the people she loved. Even if he died he would not let that happen. Not because he cared about what might happened to the Academy or the people in it but she didn't want Mikan to end up sharing the same fate as him and seeing her smile be replaced by tears. He knew she'd cry. And he wouldn't be able to get her out from there.

Subaru stood up, glancing at his patient, to Natsume and then Narumi. There was uneasiness in his eyes. "So are we just going to let him die?"

Narumi, avoiding eye contact with everyone in the room sighed and said. "The consequences will be far greater if we let Mikan's Alice fall into the principal's hand. I hate to say it, but there's no other way. Ruka will die."


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

The cool wind breezed through a Sakura tree up to the night sky where the moon hid itself behind the veil of clouds. Tonight was very quiet and tensed as if the whole place had lost its sound. Birds stopped chirping, water stopped splashing and not even a single insect's sound was heard. The forest held its breath as if not wanting to aggravate the boy sitting on a Sakura tree bough — the one he always climbed whenever he seek for serenity, further. Natsume's eyes were way darker as he stared into nothingness below. Fog appeared in front of his mouth when he breathed out, but his stiff body couldn't feel the cold. He couldn't feel anything at the moment.

Natsume walked out of the hospital to get some fresh air and relieve the tightness he felt around his chest, but he was unable to direct his feet back to the place where his friend lied helplessly, waiting for his death. He felt like killing himself every time he saw Ruka's suffering face and be reminded that nothing, nothing could save him. Even the only antidote they knew, the Stealing Alice, was out of his consideration as it would equally hurt the first person he ever cared for beside Ruka and his sister, Aoi. The girl he loved. One of the reasons why he decided to stay in here even after Aoi was rescued, to protect her smile. To ask her to save Ruka's life when he knew it would lead her to the path of destruction was just, cruel.

He spoke this out of experience. Years he went through as the principal's dog. The kind of life anybody would never want to have. What he said didn't matter. What he felt should be concealed. His life only devoted to missions by missions and keeping his head down— so down he felt lower than dirt, in front of the people he hated. Blood and weapons had become his everyday sight. It was no place for such an innocent girl who would voluntarily jump into the fire thinking optimistically she could save everyone. Yeah, so optimistic that she probably could never condemned the people who made her suffer and pity them instead. After all she always managed to find good amongst all evil, didn't she?

The gust of wind brushed his face again. He felt safe up in the tree. Beside, being closer to the sky he felt less trapped by the Academy barrier and able to look further beyond the tall gates that he probably could never proudly walked through like other students on their graduation day. On that supposed to-be-happy day, he usually skipped the ceremony and went deeper, deeper into the woods where he wouldn't accidentally run into any graduating student or witnessed them moving on to continue their life outside the gate which reminded him of something he could never had. Even if he somehow survived until graduation, would Kuonji let him off so easily? He knew too much of their evildoing that they'd have him do missions until the day he died.

Oftentimes, when Natsume drowned in thoughts of all the negative things that life threw at him Ruka would always come and be his company. Wherever he hid in the Academy Ruka was always able to find him. Merely his presence was enough to calm him down, made him think that despite all the treachery and corruptions, this Academy still have something worth saving. Oh he missed him already. Subaru said Ruka only had until tomorrow night and probably wouldn't even make it till sunrise. What should he do? Scream? Took his anger out on somebody else? He couldn't even cry right now. As always he swallowed all the burdens to himself.

"Natsume!" He heard someone shouted his name from under the tree. He glanced down to see Mikan, wearing her winter cape, stared at him. How could she find him? It didn't matter. He didn't really want to talk right now so he pretended to look the other way and neglecting her presence. Of course it pissed her. "Hey, Natsume! I've had enough of you ignoring me. Are you deaf?" No response. Mikan, pushed at the edge of her patience began climbing the tree. "You just wait until I get there and I'll make sure you listen to me this time!" She shouted with all her loudness. For a girl, she climbed pretty fast and soon she already reached the bough where Natsume was sitting.

"What are you doing here, monkey girl?"Natsume mocked. He actually didn't have any desire to tease her but apparently it already became a habit.

"What did you say!? I'm not a monkey! Because of whom do you think I had to climb this tree in the first place?" She shook her hands angrily in the air then folded her arms. "Geez, I was on my way back to the dorm and got worried when I saw you up here alone. Narumi-sensei said you were hospitalized." Natsume rolled his eyes. Of course that perverted teacher had to inform the whole class that he forcefully hospitalized him. "You're already out from there so that means you're fine now?"

Natsume couldn't answer. Was he fine? If the shortness of breath, massive headache and the depression he's feeling right now didn't count then yes, he's fine.

Knowing that she wouldn't get any response to the question Mikan changed the subject. "Hey, Natsume. Why don't you wear your cape? It's freezing out here. You'll get sick again. The air is so cold that I think snow might fall soon. I really hope we can see the snow before Christmas, though. I want to see it with everyone just like last year." She looked at the night sky while she kept on blabbering. "Oh, I haven't got a chance to say happy birthday to you. You even missed the whole surprised party that we planned."

"I never asked for it." He said quietly.

"But every one worked so hard for it you know? You shouldn't be too hard on yourself. Aoi would be sad to see his big brother like this." Mikan thought by bringing up about Aoi, Natsume would lighten up a bit, but his expression remained the same. His mind seemed to drift far from here. It could be about the missions, but no. He's quieter than usual. Something else seemed to be bothering him. Mikan remembered that Natsume acted strange this morning. "By the way, when I came to your room this morning, why were you so in a hurry? Ah, come to think of it Ruka-pyon didn't come to class either today. I'm a little worried because it's so strange that he slipped a letter that told me to check on you along with your key into my room in the middle of the night as if he wouldn't be able to see you himself the next day. I wanted to ask him but I haven't seen him since. Could he be sick or something?"

Natsume held his breath when Mikan asked the dreaded question. She couldn't have known about Ruka. Narumi definitely didn't tell the class about him being sick, otherwise she would already jump to the hospital right now, which Natsume knew she shouldn't, as she could accidentally use her Alice while visiting Ruka.

"Ruka's fine." Natsume decided to lie.

"Really? You don't seem so sure. Did something happen between you two?" Mikan asked. Natsume hated how quickly she could see through him and how his shaking tone wasn't doing any great job either in convincing her about Ruka. Well, if she really wanted to know, Ruka's not fine at all. He'd be dead by tomorrow night. She might not be able to see Ruka again, they all wouldn't be able to and it's entirely his fault. His useless self, unable to protect the people that meant to him. Turned out this tore him apart more than any pain he ever felt, and he had experienced many kinds of pain by now. All this time he thought he'd be the first one to die, leaving all his friends and family. He had known and accepted it for his whole life but he wasn't prepared for this. If Ruka died, how could he keep on fighting against the world? How could he even face her again? He should as well cursed himself to the deepest pit of hell because he deserved that didn't he? He should be the one to die and not Ruka. He—

Natsume was taken by surprise when suddenly a pair of hands reached his shoulder and comfortingly wrapped around his back, creating an unexpectedly soothing feelings. It took a moment for him to realize that Mikan was hugging him, burying his face into her chest. She was warm, and he didn't resist at all. But a second later as if reality hit her head she jerked away from him and her face blushed fiercely as she became aware of her bold act. "So-sorry, I-I really don't know why my body moved on its own." She made a whimsical gesture with her hands. "It's just, you made such a sad face, a-and grandpa used to say that you could calm a person down by hugging them, so without realizing it I—"

Without saying anything Natsume pulled her arms towards him until they were back hugging. Mikan, who thought that Natsume should be mad because she carelessly hugged him, was very surprised by his unusual reaction. "Na-natsume?"

"Don't say anything." Natsume replied with a slightly tender tone. "Just for now, let me stay like this." It's been so long since anyone touched him that affectionately. He forgot how comfortable it was, to not always have to stay alert all the time and fear that people might try to hurt him. Those hands were tender and somewhat protective, and he felt in her arm she could loosen the weight on his shoulder even just for a little while. He loved her, and it didn't matter if she didn't like him back. She probably loved Ruka more. Well, who doesn't? Who would choose an insolent jerk like him over someone with soft caring attitude and heart-warming smile like Ruka? But then again sense of guilty started to catch up to him. "Sorry." He whispered under his breath, in such a small voice that Mikan wouldn't be able to hear it.

"Natsume? What happe—"

"Seems like you two are having fun up there." The two of them nearly jumped out of their skin, startled by a loud voice coming from below. Sakurano, the Student Council President waved at them with a smile on his face.

"Sa, Sakurano-senpai." Mikan quickly pushed her body away from Natsume. Once again her face blush a deep red. "This isn't—" She unnecessarily panicked.

"What do you want? Sneaking on people late at night like this. Is this how the Student Council President behaves?" Natsume snarled. He looked clearly unhappy with Sakurano's sudden interruption.

"Actually," Sakurano stayed calm. "I'm here to look for you, Natsume. Principal Yukihara wants you to meet him in his office."

"The High School Principal?" Mikan reeled.

Natsume was equally confused. Why would the High School Principal summon him? He'd never talked to him in person before but he knew that he's also someone who discreetly against Kuonji in any way. However it was in vain as all this time he only ensconced behind his status as principal and watched those who suffered because of Kuonji without ever intending to offer any help or stop his atrocity either. So, in the end they were not much different. But then Natsume heard a voice, somebody's talking inside his head.

_ As the elementary school principal's Black Ops, the sudden interest of the high school principal must have aroused your suspicion. But, if it can help to convince you I'll tell you that it's about a matter regarding Ruka Nogi._

That definitely got his attention. Sakurano must've used his Telepathy to talk to him because it seemed from her expression that Mikan didn't hear anything. Natsume jumped from the tree and landed beside Sakurano. He winced a little when the action caused him pain from the wounds he had forgotten. Luckily nobody noticed this.

"Hold my hand. I'm going to teleport us right into the office." Sakurano said. Natsume did as he was told. Before they completely teleported, he looked over his shoulder to Mikan "Polka Dots, you better go back to your room now before you'd start blaming me for causing you to catch a cold." Actually he could've said it in a much nicer way but Natsume felt the need to cover his worries and not showing more of his weak side in front of her. Anymore of his strange behavior and even a dull girl like her would notice that something's wrong.

"And I can also clearly see your underwear from here." He had to add. He didn't mean to taunt her but he just couldn't stand it as that girl should've learned by now how to close her legs properly so any man wouldn't just pass by and see her underwear that easily. They vaguely heard Mikan yelling back at Natsume for calling her 'Polka Dots' and being a pervert but a second later they arrived at a completely different place.

Natsume had been on the high school department a couple times but nowhere near the principal's office. It was closely guarded especially from a Dangerous Ability like him. Inside the office, Principal Yukihara was sitting on his desk. Unexpectedly standing behind him was Tonouchi from the High School Section and Tsubasa Andou. Their faces looked serious. Whatever it was, Natsume certainly wasn't happy at the fact that they're also involved in this matter. What were they planning to do by calling him here? How did they know about Ruka?

"Welcome to my office Natsume Hyuuga." The principal turned his gaze from the paper he was reading to him. Natsume walked closer to the group, followed closely by Sakurano. "I called you here because I got news from Imai Subaru that a student from Elementary Section is currently hospitalized for bearing Persona's 'Mark of Death'. I was also informed that this student is apparently a close friend of you and Sakura Mikan, is it true?" Natsume nodded. "Therefore I presume that you must already know that unless a Stealing Alice is used to absorb the mark from his body, there's no way that Ruka Nogi will survive."

"Yes." Natsume stiffly answered. Is there any need to remind him about something so obvious?

The principal sighed. "Have you told Mikan Sakura about this incident?"

Natsume slightly shook his head. "No."

Principal Yukihara replied with a nod. "It's a wise act. We don't want Mikan Sakura to be involved with this matter if possible, so I'm glad you didn't tell her anything for her own sake. As the only person who owns the Stealing Alice in this Academy she's being targeted by the Elementary School Principal. We're fortunate that he has no proof that she own the ability given the situation that Mikan herself still hasn't aware of that. But with this matter, things can turn around quickly. Natsume, you of all people must know what the Elementary School Principal can do if he got hold of her power. We can't let it happen. You also don't want it to happen right?"

They all waited for his agreement to Principal Yukihara's words, but Natsume's mind was racing as it became clear to him that the reason why he was called here was to be given a warning. This man must be so afraid that to safe Ruka he'd make Mikan use her Alice and resulting in Kuonji to gain more power which will then lead to his downfall. All this time, they were in an unofficial truce after all. He wouldn't want to risk it only for a worthless student's life, because that's how they always think. At this stage though, it wasn't surprising to Natsume anymore that none of the officials in this school actually cared about the life and well-being of their students. So much about saying to protect and teach students how to control and use their Alice properly. This institution was merely trying to gain profits and power by using the ability of the Alices possessed by students and taking the opportunity of government's support to cover up their crimes. Once you get in their way or have no use to them anymore, they'll just get rid of you.

The funny thing was, that principal even stated it in a way that made him felt to be the one responsible for the impact of this incident, despite the life of his friend being at stake. Once again, he acted like a good guy, winning the war without even lifted one finger. Of course. That's what pawns like him were for right?

"Natsume? Do you hear me?" Principal Yukihara said and Natsume realized all eyes were on him.

Feeling infuriated, he turned and walked towards the door. "If that's all you want to say then I'll be off."

"Natsume!" He heard Sakurano called him. Natsume wondered what kind of promises the High School bPrincipal gave to make a man like him to become his lapdog.

He looked over his shoulder one more time. "Don't worry. I don't plan on letting that man get what he wants or handing over Mikan to him, so you can rest assured about it. And to the least of your concern, my friend is probably going to die tomorrow, and if there's nothing that can save him I'd rather not waste any more time here listening to your hypocritical rant."

"Stop Natsume!" This time the principal himself tried to stop him but he knew he wasn't going to listen. "Don't you want to save Ruka Nogi's life?"

He halted right as the words were spoken. "What are you saying?" He asked cautiously, not wanting to be fooled by false hopes.

Principal Yukihara stood up. "You might've got me wrong Natsume, but I don't blame you. Given the life you've been through until now, it made you couldn't easily trust others, but we're not your enemies. The reason why I called you here is to tell you that there might be a way to save your friend's life without sacrificing Mikan's."

"Stop kidding me. You said it yourself that Ruka can only be cured by the Stealing Alice."

"That's true." Principal Yukihara said. "But the source of its power doesn't have to be Mikan. Do you know Natsume, that there's a Stealing Alice Stone hidden somewhere in this Academy?"

This time he really got his attention. "Alice Stone?"

"Yes. It belonged to a previous student of this Academy who also has the same Alice as Mikan, a woman named Azumi Yuka. I'm sure you've met her once."

That name certainly rang a bell for Natsume. It was the woman who stole Tobita's Alice, a Z's accomplice and also the mother of Mikan. Natsume knew about this fact for quite a long time now when he accidentally overheard their conversation but he never told anyone about this and he realized it'd be best to keep it that way.

The principal talked again with a rather sad expression now on his face. "Just like you Natsume, Azumi Yuka used to be the Elementary Principal's favorite. He forced her to use her ability to steal the Alices of dying people and put them all in a hidden room in this Academy. Among those stones he collected, there must be Yuka's own Alice Stone as I know that man wouldn't have missed the chance of owning such a valuable power. If we can get our hands on that stone and by amplifying its power using Tonouchi's Alice, I'm sure we can use it to absorb Persona's Alice from Ruka's body."

Natsume frowned, thinking about the 'sounds too good to be true' plan that Principal Yukihara told him. Could he really save Ruka with the stone? How many years had it been on the Elementary School Principal's possession? They weren't even sure if the stone still existed. "If he has the Alice stone of the power he wanted so much, shouldn't he have used it himself instead of keeping it hidden?" He asked.

"I don't think so." Principal Yukihara replied. "Since Yuka escaped from this Academy, that stone is the only remaining of the power he thought he'd never be able to lay his hands on anymore so the Elementary School Principal must be thinking to save it for urgent situation. I know that stealing the Alice stone from him isn't a wise plan but considering we've run out of option this is our only chance to save Ruka Nogi. Now it's up to you whether you want to take it or not Natsume."

"I will." Natsume answered without a second thought. Only a small chance was all he needed to make up his mind.

The principal nodded. "The problem is, if we involved the Elementary Principal in this matter, whatever deal that Ruka made with Persona will most likely to be terminated unilaterally. If I'm not mistaken the deal was meant to free you from your missions. Are you still okay with that? Moreover, whether you succeed or not, trying to steal from the Elementary Principal himself will grant you with severe punishments. They won't let you get away easily with this. With your current body right now Natsume, are you sure you can live to bear the consequences?"

Natsume shrugged. "I don't care about the deal. I know Persona too well. Even if there's other way, it's not like he's going to keep his promise. And as long as they don't intend to kill me, which I know they won't, then I'll be fine. I've lived with punishments for years now. It takes more than that to stop me."

"Sadly, I must say I'm glad to hear that."

"I'll come with you." Tsubasa said suddenly.

"Tsubasa?" Tonouchi looked at him.

"I don't need your help, you shadow-freak. You'll only get in my way." The mission alone would be tough enough. Natsume didn't need any extra burden to take care of. Even though Tsubasa was in the Dangerous Ability he didn't want to drag him into this. Beside, the punishment he'd received once he stole the stone, he'd feel guilty if Tsubasa was also going to get caught for helping him.

"I won't get in your way." He said seriously. "I can't let you go alone. The chance for success will be greater if you let me come. Besides, if something happens to you Mikan will be sad." Since the day Tsubasa witnessed how Natsume coughed up blood he had been keeping an extra eye on him. He knew Natsume needed help, but he would never say it to avoid other people beside him getting hurt. At first Tsubasa didn't understand why a twelve year old boy like him had to act so tough, but now being on the Dangerous Ability himself, he kind of understood his reasons. "Who said I'm asking for your permission. I'm going whether you like it or not." If Natsume's a stubborn guy then he could also be persistent.

"Tch."

"Are you aware of the consequences if you get caught, Tsubasa?" Principal Yukihara asked him.

"Yes." He answered confidently. "I'm also a member of DA after all. I can take care of myself."

The principal nodded. "Then I won't stop you. Now, if we want to infiltrate the ESP's office we're going to need a solid plan." He cued for them to gather around him. "I was informed that the ESP will be attending a meeting with the government tomorrow night, so that's when we will carry out our plan. The location of all the Alice stones the ESP collected is in a hidden room behind his office. To get there, you need to pass all the guards around the area, which I'm sure isn't a problem for you both. The hardest part will be getting through the barrier that he casted around the office."

"I can take care of that." Natsume said as he pulled out the necklace of Alice Stones he hung around his neck and pointed to the orange-colored stone that Mikan gave him. "It's Mikan's nullification stone. It should hold enough power to nullify the barrier until we get the stone and escape from that place."

Principal Yukihara took the Alice Stone from Natsume's hand. "For a stone this big, you'll have about fifteen minutes before the power runs out. If that happened before you get out then the barrier will entrapped the two of you inside. Moreover, the moment you break his barrier the ESP will realize it and he'll immediately return to the Academy, so make sure you have already escaped before it happened."

They both nodded.

"Once you're inside, search for a hidden door behind the bookshelf and look for an Alice stone which has a similar color to Mikan's but darker. I can't give you more detail but the ESP must keep it somewhere in that room."

"What about Persona?" Tsubasa asked.

"I'll try to keep him busy and distract him from the ESP's office as far as possible. While the ESP's away, Persona'll have no choice but to listen to my orders as the High School Principal." He explained.

"I can also help clearing your path to the office." Tonouchi offered.

"No, we need you to stand by on Ruka's room and help Subaru with his Alice so he can maintain the spreading of Persona's Alice until Tsubasa and Natsume get the stone." The principal ordered which then answered by Tono with a nod. "And for you Sakurano, I want you to keep me updated with all of the ESP's schedules and movements starting from tonight. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Well then, do you have any more questions?" None of them said anything. "Our plan may seem simple enough but don't underestimate the risks as we're dealing with a very dangerous man. Beside Tsubasa and Natsume, I'll try to cover up your involvement in this plan so you won't get into any trouble after. That'll be all for now. I'll inform you should there be any changes on our plan."

They left the room one by one, leaving Natsume and Principal Yukihara inside. "What is it Natsume?" the principal asked. "Do you still have anything that you'd like to ask me?"

Natsume stared at the man, and then decided to utter the question he had on his mind since earlier. "Why now?" He began. "All this time you kept your eyes closed from the students who suffered because of the ESP. What change it? Why offering to help now?"

The principal fell silent for a moment. He seemed hesitated to answer but eventually he said. "A very close acquaintance of mine used to be the victim of Persona's Alice too, and in the end he died because of it. Even now I still regret it because I couldn't save him at that time. That student, Ruka Nogi, he really reminds me of him. I just don't want the same incident to happen again."

Him? Who might be the principal referred to? That incident he was talking about must took place many years ago, probably when his mother was still a student in this Academy. But as curious as he could be, Natsume decided not to ask anymore and left the room along with the others.

Natsume returned to the hospital and stayed there for the night. Ruka still hadn't regained consciousness and his fever was getting higher. Subaru visited them every couple hours and rested himself in between. He used his Alice to stabilize Ruka's body temperatures and undo the bruises which seemed to spread faster every time. He said that Persona must have touched Ruka long enough that his Alice even entered his blood vessels and therefore travelled throughout his body faster. He already looked exhausted on his second visit that night. To top it all, Natsume coughed up blood and his body sore all over. He tried to hide it but Subaru wouldn't be a doctor if he didn't realize right away that Natsume too, was in pain. Natsume strictly refused when Subaru tried to heal him and told him to just focus on keeping Ruka alive. He used the healing stone from Mikan to relieve himself when Subaru confirmed that Mikan had hurriedly asked him to make the stone the day before.

The day after, Natsume also skipped the class so he could avoid all the students from swarming over him and ask questions about Ruka. Besides, he felt weird attending classes without Ruka sitting beside him. Tonouchi came in the morning to assist Subaru. The bruises had already covered almost all of Ruka's left side along with his face as Subaru narrowed down the use of his Alice to protect the most important organs from getting infected.

With the two of them there, Natsume went back to his room, locked the door hastily and took as many pain killers as he could swallow when he could no more stand the pain that crept on every single cells of his body. It seemed that the burdens of having to do three missions in the last week and the accumulated stress had finally taken its toll on his body. He curled up on his bed and squeezed his eyes shut; desperately hoping the medicines would work soon and numb all his senses. He fought the urge to fall asleep and didn't let himself rest too long before he started preparing for tonight's plan. It'd be his only chance to save Ruka, and thus he must not fail.

Two hours after the sun had set, Tsubasa came to the hospital and confirmed that the ESP had already left, taking Rui and Yakumo along to escort him, and Persona was nowhere to be seen so they were clear to start their plan. Natsume got a feeling that Persona purposely excluded him from the mission and let him stay in the Academy so he could watch with his own eyes when Ruka died. Well, it's going to be his biggest mistake. Before he left with Tsubasa, Natsume glanced one more time at Ruka, convincing himself that this wasn't going to be the last time he saw him. He promised to bring him Yuka's Alice Stone; he would, no matter what.

* * *

The clouds looked like it's going to rain soon. Mikan sped up her steps when she heard the sound of thunder rumbling above. She hated it that she was the only one that had to stay in class for Jinno-sensei's extra lesson because she miserably failed the tests and her grades was one of the lowest in the class. The teacher wouldn't allow her to go back to the dorm before she could solve one equation. It took about three hours before she finally finished with her remedial and the teacher was pleased with the result. All of her friends had returned to the dorm long before her to plan for the slumber party in Permy's room tonight. Even Hotaru busied herself to help preparing for the party as she thought it'd be less troublesome than waiting at school for Mikan's brain to work.

So here she was, walking the road back to the dorm alone. When she passed the Sakura trees she observed her surroundings carefully hoping maybe, just maybe she would find Natsume again like last time. It's not like she wanted to specifically look for him after their last conversation ended up with him seeing her underwear but Natsume's behavior last night was a bit off and she had a bad feeling about it. As she walked among the Sakura trees she saw no sign of Natsume around. Where could he be? On top of that, nobody; not even the teachers said they had seen Ruka for two days. Two days! Ruka would never just disappear suddenly without telling anyone like this. He might have gotten himself into trouble and Natsume must know something about it.

"Good evening, Mikan Sakura." A voice called her.

Startled, Mikan turned around to see where the voice came from. Persona emerged from behind the shade of trees and approached her. He didn't wear his mask. Mikan took a step back every time Persona got closer.

"You don't need to be scared. I'm not going to hurt you." Persona said and he took no more steps. "See?"

"What do you want? N-Natsume's not here."

"I'm not here for Natsume." Persona said. "I was looking for you."

The words spoken in such a sharp tone gave her goosebumps. "Me?"

"Yes. I came all the way here to tell you something important." Mikan's first instinct when she saw Persona was to run. Whatever he wanted to say, nothing good would come out of it. Natsume had warned her to stay away from this man, but she found herself unable to move as she stared into his eyes.

Knowing that the fish had taken the bait, Persona smirked. "Don't you want to know where Ruka Nogi is?"


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: **Hi guys! To be honest I had some struggles while writing this chapter, especially since English isn't the language we normally use in my country. At some point, I even thought of discontinuing this story but after saying that I would start to write again the next day because I love writing and I don't want to let you guys down. I'm proud that I can finally upload this chapter for you all to read. Once again, sorry for any grammar mistakes and my limited vocabulary. Despite that, I really hope you can enjoy this story. :)

* * *

CHAPTER 6

It was starting to rain when Tsubasa and Natsume arrived at the Academy Headquarters. Natsume looked more exhausted and out of breath than normal people would have after they ran from the hospital to the Headquarters building. He wiped the sweat that trickled down his face while the other hand clutched to his chest. He felt his heart pounding madly inside like it was going to explode. He remembered what the doctor told him about his illnesses that could lead to heart failure if he continues to overwork his body or the use of his Alice. He prayed that it didn't happen now of all times. He waited for a moment to calm himself down before he staggered towards Tsubasa who caught him just in time before he fell.

"Are you okay Natsume?" Tsubasa asked worriedly.

"I'm fine." Natsume's voice was heavy. He scrambled to his feet and when black spots started to appear in his vision, he quickly shook it off and carried on. The pain killers he had taken earlier helped to lessen the pain and prevent him from breaking down. If not for the drugs he might not even be able to stand up at all. However now's not the time to feel sorry for himself as Ruka's life was at stake and depending on the success of their plan.

They hid at the corner of the building behind the shadows, eyeing carefully at their surroundings. As expected, not a single body was seen outside the building. The High School Principal had commanded to move the guarding posts of all the Fuukitai from the outermost area of the headquarters to the High School Division that night by faking a rumor about students uprising. Thanks to that, they'd have fewer guards to deal with.

After making sure the first floor was clear, they came out of their hidings and ran across the hall to the stairs. Tsubasa slowed down when he saw Natsume was a little left behind. He adjusted his pace until he was next to him. "Don't wait for me." Natsume said as they kept running. "I'm slowing you down."

"I'm worried about you. Besides, it seems that there are no guards in this area."

"Yeah, looks like that old man keeps his promise. But we're not going to be this lucky up to the next floor."

Just as they were about to reach the stairs they heard someone shouted. "Hey, you! Stop right there!" A man in the Fuukitai's uniform spotted them from the end of a corridor on the right and started sprinting towards them.

Before Tsubasa could react, Natsume had lunged at the man. He ran in an incredible speed and the moment the enemy was within his reach the first thing he did was covering the Fuukitai's mouth with his hand to drown the screaming sound and then knocked him out by throwing his knee to the man's solar plexus. It all happened in a flash.

Tsubasa ran after him. "That was close. It will be bad if he called for backup." He stared at the unconscious man. "How could you move so fast? I thought you were exhausted a moment ago."

"I still am." Natsume stated as he panted. "But my body just moved on its own. Results of training and experience I guess. Let's go."

Natsume led their way this time. They walked more cautiously, expecting the possibility of sudden attack at every turn, until Natsume stopped in front of the stairs. He turned to Tsubasa. "Before we go any further, can you promise me one thing?"He said seriously.

"What is it?" Tsubasa asked.

"If after we get the stone but one of us didn't make it out of here, then the other has to leave and deliver the stone to Ruka, no matter what. It's our first priority. And also, don't do something stupid as coming back here after that. Once the guards see our faces, we'll be guaranteed punishments for sure. Don't need to make their job easier by letting yourself get caught. If we managed to escape at least we can get treated for the injuries before facing the unavoidable punishments, and believe me; it's a luxury we won't get in a long time after this."

Tsubasa knew that Natsume wasn't exaggerating. He'd been on so many missions that he knew he needed to say this beforehand so Tsubasa could leave him if things got worse. He thought his chance to make it out of here was not much with his current state right now, or he'd sacrifice himself so Tsubasa could escape with the stone if necessary. But he decided to come here on his own, knowing every risk, so Natsume shouldn't feel responsible if anything were to happen to him. Tsubasa was about to dispute his words but when he stared into the crimson eyes of his they were full of determination, so instead he said "I don't like the idea of leaving you behind, but yeah I promise to bring the stone to Ruka."

"Okay." He nodded.

On the second floor, Tsubasa signaled for them to stop before a turn. They hid behind the wall and counted the number of enemies. There were five in sight. The two nearest to them were just five meters ahead. The other two were standing on the right corridor across them, and the last one was guarding a door at the far left end. The door was unmistakably led to the principal's office. Natsume had been going in and out there numerous times before to report for his missions. All of the guards wore a suit and black glasses instead of Fuukitai's uniform. They were Kuonji's personal guards, meaning they're more dangerous than the man that Natsume knocked down before.

"I'll sneak through the stairs to the other side and take care of the two guards on our right." Natsume whispered. "Can you handle the two on this side?"

"No, let me handle the guards on the right. You can save your energy by taking down the nearest enemies."

Natsume nodded. "Make sure they don't see you. We need the element of surprise to confuse them." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "And whoever finishes first will have to take care of the last man guarding the office."

"Okay." Tsubasa said. "But please don't use your Alice unless necessary."

"I know." Natsume watched as Tsubasa went down the stairs until he was out of sight. Then he focused his eyes back on the enemies. The guard furthest to them just yawned, and the other two were talking to each other. Having to guard an empty office definitely decreased their alertness. They had no idea what's coming at them. He counted until ten before he caught a glimpse of Tsubasa on the other side of the corridor, ready to attack. Tsubasa waited for him to give the signal. On the count of three, they rushed to the enemies.

Natsume took the first guard down even before he noticed him coming. He wrapped his arm to lock the head of his target while the other hand positioned itself at the back of his skull and hit him hard on his nape. The second guard turned around to see his fellow had already fallen to the ground and opened his mouth to alarm the others. "Intruder! We have an—"Before he finished his sentence Natsume landed a powerful kick on his body which sent him flying and hit the wall. The man tried to stand up but he was too slow. Natsume aimed for his temple to instantly knock him out as he adjusted his punch so the brain wouldn't be severely damaged. _It was pretty easy_—he thought. He didn't even have to use his Alice. Probably because they were caught off guard or he was just getting better in combat from having to deal with professional killers all the time.

"Natsume!" Tsubasa shouted his name. He stood nonchalantly in front of his enemies who couldn't move an inch or speak as they were trapped by his Alice and shadows bound them like an invisible rope up to their mouth. He pointed at the door to the office which was unguarded now as the man standing in front of it before had fled. "He's calling for backups!"

"Tch!" It's going to be bothersome. He didn't estimate the last guard to have the Teleportation Alice. He should've taken him down earlier. Now their plan to sneak in and leave quietly was screwed. The only choice was to get into the office before the enemy reinforcements came. It's now or never. Natsume lunged forward, followed by Tsubasa who had left the guards after he forced them to do a hundred push-ups.

Just a few more steps to the door, a group of Fuukitai suddenly appeared out of nowhere in front of them and swarmed over the corridor, blocking their way. Both Natsume and Tsubasa stopped as they realized more enemies were coming from behind. At the same time, four of the ESP's guards were also running towards them from the left, their guns pointed directly at them. "Don't move!" One of them ordered.

Completely surrounded, they stood with their backs to each other. "What should we do?" Tsubasa asked.

Natsume was sweating. "How many of them you can entrap within your shadows?"

"I couldn't cover up a large area at once if they're coming at us from every direction. From here, I think I can entrap most enemies if I use my Alice on the Fuukitai that grouped behind us."

"Then do it. I'll take care of the rest."

"What do you mean? There're still so many of them. You can't—"

"Now!" Natsume exclaimed as one of Kuonji's guard gave the signal and all the Fuukitai pounced on them at once. Tsubasa reacted quickly and when the enemies got close enough to him that all of their shadows overlapped, he used the chance to paralyze every single one of them within his reach. They struggled, trying to free themselves from his Alice but not even a tip of their finger could move. Tsubasa smirked, watching his enemies trapped just like insects in a spider's web. It required him an immense amount of concentration to keep that many people immobilized, but luckily the training he got when he moved to the Dangerous Ability class seemed to help improve the control of his Alice a lot.

Before the rest of the Fuukitai reached them, Natsume created a big ring of fire that surrounded the Fuukitai, making them stepped back in shock. Then he lit another circle of flame that wrapped the ESP's personal guards who hadn't move from their position. Natsume was already out of breath but he pushed his fire up, making the flames bigger so the enemies could barely see them. He heard them shouted at each other behind the fire but nothing they did could put it out. Now that no enemies were blocking their path anymore, Natsume ran towards the door and activated the nullification Alice stone to put down the barrier. Once the barrier disappeared Natsume kicked the door open. "Tsubasa!" He called.

"That boy is breaking into the principal's office!" One of the guards shouted.

"Shoot him!"

"Don't! They're students from Dangerous Ability, and one of them is the Black Cat. Without the Prinsipal's order, we can't harm them."

"Shit! Call the ESP! And get more backups over here!"

"Go!" Tsubasa said. "Get the stone! I'll hold them here."

Natsume nodded and went inside the office. He didn't know how long his fire could last. Even now his chest ached as the effect of overusing his Alice. But the moment his fire went out Tsubasa would be in a lot of trouble. Mikan's Alice stone felt warm around his neck. It somehow gave him the strength he needed to keep going.

He looked around the office. His eyes immediately set on a medium-sized wooden bookshelf which was placed against one side of the wall behind Kuonji's desk. It was the only bookshelf in the room that wasn't permanently attached to the wall. There was no furniture on each side of the shelf so he could easily move it with his body and revealed a small hidden door behind just like Principal Yukihara said. It was a flush steel door which instead of handle had some mechanism that consisted of small panel that could contain up to four letters and a keyboard embedded to the middle part of the door. _Damn it!_—He thought. Nobody said that he had to enter the password to get in. Of course they also didn't know.

He didn't have much time to try entering the password randomly. The ESP must already be on his way here and he needed to get out before the Alice stone's power ran out. What could it be? _Think, Natsume. The keyword must be something related to that man._—he said to himself. While he tried to list all of the possibilities his mind came across one thing. —_Wait a minute. Isn't this room…?_

Before he got a chance to input the password, three Fuukitai appeared behind him using Teleportation. Because the barrier had collapsed, the enemies could certainly use their Alice to chase him here. Natsume wasted no time and aimed a fireball towards them. It missed, but the shot had accomplished its purpose to scatter them around. Natsume began by taking down the nearest Fuukitai that accidentally ran to his direction to avoid the fire as fast as he could, and then swiftly shifted to the next one. One of them managed to grab him from behind and strangled his neck with his arms, but Natsume lit a fire on that man's shoulder, making him reflexively let him go. He took the momentum and pulled the Fuukitai's hand to his side, forcing his body to tumble forward and then landed a punch on his jaw. Soon three of his enemies had lied unconscious on the floor.

But Natsume also took his own damage. Turned out creating just a small fireball was already too much for him. He let out a cough as his chest was burning and he could feel the fire he used to confine the enemies outside began to weaken. He struggled to keep his fire burning but the inside of his body were also getting hotter and hotter with each effort he put out. This is bad. Persona ever told him during one of their training that if things like this happened then he needed to quickly control the amount of Alice he released; otherwise it could backfire and roast his internal organs. He took a couple of deep breath and tried to get the excess heat out of his body. Instead of trying to add more flames he concentrated on keeping the existing fire burning by decreasing its temperature, just enough to make those who were trapped inside feel the heat so they wouldn't dare to take a step out of the circle. Once the scorching heat inside his body subsided he felt his Alice became more stable and no longer tried to kill him. He let out a relieved sigh.

Natsume went over to the hidden door and began to type the password. He didn't expect much but he thought it's worth a try since that's all he could think of at the moment. He input the letters one by one until the word 'Y-U-K-A' appeared on the screen and hit the enter button. Nothing happened. He thought the password was wrong but then the machine beeped twice before the door swung open by itself. _Man! That principal really has some sick obsession towards a married woman—_Natsume thought disgustingly. Nonetheless, he proceeded into the room and slack-jawed with disbelief at what he saw.

That place was as big as a three-star student's dorm room. In fact, it was the exact replication of that, with a queen size bed placed in the middle, two nightstands on each side, a single couch in the corner, along with a desk which was piled with dusty books on top of it. It looked completely normal, except that instead of wall, high-rise shelves rack up to the ceiling on every side of the room. The shelves were filled with countless jars that contained Alice Stones which were divided based on their colors on each jar. There could be hundreds of Alice Stones stored in here. Natsume shuddered. It's just crazy. What does Kuonji intend to do by collecting this much stone? Still lost for words, he turned his gaze in shock to see a rusty shackle which was lying on the bed with one of its ends attached to the metal headboard and some dark stains around the mattress. He knew what it was. Blood. He looked around one more time and realized there wasn't even a single window in here. This isn't a room. It's a prison.

It wasn't difficult for him to guess who Kuonji used to keep in here. He remembered what Principal Yukihara said; _Yuka Azumi was the Elementary School Principal's favorite because of her Alice_. But seeing this room, it seemed that there're more reasons than that. Kuonji's obsession towards power had made him wanted to keep Yuka for himself, that he even took away her freedom by locking her up, limiting her world in such a small place surrounded by all the Alices she stole as a brutal reminder that she could never be able to escape from this place or from him, not after all the sins she committed with her Alice. Just by looking at this room, Natsume felt a burning rage arise inside him. He wanted to destroy this place, he wanted to demolish everything that man created with his own hands. He had caused too much suffering to many people only for his own ambitions.

No wonder that woman—Yuka, joined Z after she escaped from here. They had the same goals, to take down the same enemy. Even though they're fighting on different sides, Natsume secretly admired her. She was the first person to escape from Kuonji, and knowing that such thing was possible had lit a flame of hope inside him. That's why during his missions he never really used his full power to battle Z. Apart from defending himself, he would avoid killing if not necessary or failing the mission in purpose sometimes when he knew how much Kuonji would lose if he did that. However, the punishments he'd received after were worth it. At least he could proudly show them that he wouldn't just be an obedient dog that wagged its tail every time food was thrown. If he fights, he'd fight for himself. For the sake of the people he loved, not for them. All this time that thought was the only thing keeping his sanity in such a cruel and inhumane place like this Academy.

The sirens went off like crazy outside. They were really busted. The whole security personnel in the Academy might come after them anytime now. He hoped Tsubasa was fine. But if they wanted to get out of here alive, he needed to find Yuka's Alice Stone quickly. The problem was, he never thought there would be this much stones in the room. How's he supposed to find one stone among the others? He glanced at all the shelves from top to bottom, left to right. There were many different color variations and sizes inside each jar. Most of the stones were blue, pink, green or yellow. There were even some paler-colored stones which similar to Mikan's but they're not the one he was looking for. Natsume went back and forth through each shelf only to find nothing. He started to lose hope. Maybe Yuka's Alice stone was never in this room after all. Maybe Principal Yukihara had miscalculated and sent them on a suicide mission.

Just when Natsume was about to move to search the next shelf, he heard the familiar sound of gun being fired from outside. He froze on the spot and his eyes widened in horror just as he couldn't stop himself from thinking about who might have gotten hit by the bullet. It couldn't be that idiot shadow guy. Those guards wouldn't dare to shot a student without an order, no matter what they did. But when the gunshot was heard one more time worries overrode his thought and Natsume scrambled to the door. He halted right before crashing into Tsubasa who suddenly appeared in front of him.

"Natsume." Tsubasa said as he tried to catch his breath. "Have you found the stone?" But before Natsume could react he lifted his head up to have a clear look at the room they were in and was just as astonished. "What the hell is this room?" He muttered.

Instead of answering him, Natsume's eyes were fixed on Tsubasa's arm that was bleeding with his blood ran all the way down and dripped to the tip of his finger. "Did they shoot you?" He asked.

Tsubasa gripped his injured arm tighter. "Yeah. The moment you broke his barrier the ESP contacted his people inside the Academy. Apparently he knows what we're after and ordered his guards to stop us no matter what the costs, even if it means shooting us with guns as long as they don't aim at our vital organs. That bastard told them they could do anything to capture us as long as we're still breathing when he got here. I managed to dodge their attacks and got away with just a graze after setting a trap outside with my shadow to slow them down, but we really need to get out of here now. The situation is getting dangerous. Please tell me you've got the stone."

"Yea I wouldn't still be standing here if I already got the stone." He replied sarcastically. "How do you think I'm supposed to find Yuka's Alice stone among those?"

"But it must be somewhere in here. My shadows won't hold them long. We've got to keep looking before more guards arrived." He said frantically and began to search the nearest shelf. Natsume said no more and also continued where he left off. But like before, without a clue, it's just the same as groping in the dark and they also haven't got much time to rummage the entire room. Natsume recognized some of the stones inside the jar and he could more or less guess what kind of Alices they hold based on the colors. Most of them were common abilities; teleportation, telepathy, divination, pheromone, lightning, wind, and lots of barrier stones that outnumbered the rest. All of the jars were made of glass but none could be opened when he tried. He was standing near the exit when he heard the voice of their pursuers drawing nearer.

"Quick! They're over here!" A rough voice shouted.

"They're here." Natsume announced and he moved closer to the door, ready to face their enemies. As soon as a figure appeared on his sight, he threw a small fireball at them and hit directly at his target this time, sending the man to run helter-skelter around the room with fire on his body. He ended up stuck in an unnaturally elongated patch of black shadow coming from a table on one side of the room that certainly one of the traps that Tsubasa had set up and screamed in pain when he couldn't move his body. Seeing the man wasn't a threat anymore, Natsume quickly put out the fire and the guard looked at him with relief in his eyes. He wasn't a cold-blooded murderer like Kuonji after all.

Recovering from the shock after seeing their comrade being burned, the rest of the guards lunged at him together this time. Before they get any closer, Natsume built a wall of fire to separate him from them right in the doorway of the hidden room. The effort didn't strain him too much as he had dispersed the ring of fire he made earlier the moment Tsubasa walked into this room. Natsume could vaguely see more people were swarming near the door to join the crowd even though most of them prefer to stay away from his fire. But he had no time to let his guard down. In the midst of the commotion, he managed to catch the sound of a gun's safety being clicked off from the other side and knew what was coming, so he quickly rolled sideways just in time before the bullet which was aimed low hit him.

"Natsume!" Tsubasa snapped his head towards Natsume when he heard the deafening sound from the gun.

"I'm fine!" Natsume shouted back as he leaned against one of the shelves. "Just stay away from the entrance and keep looking for the stone!" The gun was fired again repeatedly several times through the door and hit some of the jars, breaking them and making the Alice stones inside scattered to the ground. Natsume increased the height and size of his flame in an instant in return and force them to step back.

"It's no use! Get the Teleportation Units over here to take us inside through this damn fire!" The guard who was holding the gun barked after a couple more shot. "Do whatever it takes to catch them! The principal had ordered us to not let those two get away, otherwise there will be a damn consequence for you all to face!"

Natsume readied another ball of fire on his hand. Like hell if they think he's just going to wait until the enemies ambush them from inside and out. Once the shootings had stopped, Natsume leaped out of his hidings and was about to attack when he suddenly caught a glimpse of figure appearing out of thin air in the middle of the room out of the corner of his eye. How could they be here so soon? He promptly changed the course of his fire towards the man with the Teleportation Alice. The fireball headed directly to its target who hadn't expected such a sudden attack but the next second Natsume realized he had made a big mistake.

He overlooked the second man that teleported along with the Alice user he attacked, and that man took the opportunity to sneak behind Tsubasa who wasn't aware of his presence. When Natsume saw he had a gun on his hands and was pointing it at Tsubasa his mind went blank in an instant. Everything seemed to move in a slow motion. He didn't even notice that his feet had started running towards his friend. All he knew was he needed to get there before the bullet hit him. "Tsubasa!" He desperately shouted. Tsubasa was taken by surprise when he turned his back and saw a gun being pointed at him, but it was too late. Because of the close distance between them he couldn't do anything but witnessing in horror when the man in front of him pulled the trigger. He thought he was done for, but a second later he felt Natsume's weight was pushing him aside as he hurled himself in attempt to save him from the bullet that was slicing through the air towards them.

* * *

"Natsu...me—" Ruka whimpered in his sleep. His body was sweating and feverish. He gasped between his breathe and moved his hands slightly but his eyes were still closed.

"Ruka?" Tonouchi tried to call him but got no further response from Ruka. "Do you think he's awake?" He turned his question towards Subaru who had been sending his Alice continuously into Ruka's body. He himself would've collapsed by now if not because of Tonouchi's Alice that supported him.

Subaru quickly placed two fingers around Ruka's eyelid and hold it open to check his pupil then shook his head. "I don't think so. He hasn't been awake since yesterday and with how high his fever is I don't think he'll regain consciousness anytime soon."

Tonouchi heaved a sigh. "It's been almost an hour since Natsume and Tsubasa left. I hope nothing happens to them."

Subaru gave a nod. "If everything works according to our plan, they should be back soon. In fact, they have to. We're running out of time. Even with your help, I can only restrain Persona's Alice for another hour. After that, even though this kid is still breathing, it might already be too late to save him from the damage the Alice had caused to his internal organs."

Tonouchi curled his hands into fists, certainly not liking what he heard. Ruka's whimper once in a while left him with an uneasy feeling, thinking that such a small body had to endure such pain and they, who're supposed to be the adults, couldn't do much and even left the heaviest task to an elementary and middle school student. Well, he trusted Natsume. In fact, he had been Natsume's backup on the missions several times before, that he knew enough how competent and tough the Black Cat was. He wouldn't fail a mission, especially an important one like this. But still, he couldn't shake off the bad feelings and worries inside him that seemed to grow bigger as the clock ticked.

The first time he was introduced personally to Natsume for a mission, he thought he was just an arrogant sociopath troublemaker, the kind of type that could easily be found in the Academy. Yes, he'd heard many rumors about the infamous Black Cat but they all must be exaggerating. However you look at it, he was just an ordinary ten-year-old boy. It wasn't until he saw him in action that he realized Natsume was much more than that. Apart from his strong Alice, from the outside, he seemed merciless towards his enemies. But actually he was always careful not to inflict any injury that would mean death upon them. He'd also use his Alice in a way that would take up the least casualties, even if it means himself getting hurt.

But above all, there's something inside his crimson eyes that distinguished him from the other Dangerous Ability Tonouchi had ever worked with. The way he looked at people with the unshakable determination, the way he would never break no matter how much he was bent or despite the amount of pain he was in. That didn't seem to make any sense at all. But now he knows his reason. The source of his strength came from the will to protect his friends and families and for them he'd go as far as making a deal with the devil as long as it could ensure their safety. Tonouchi sighed once again. That boy was tough, yet he was also as fragile as glass.

The door behind them suddenly slammed open with a loud noise and to their surprise, Mikan stormed in. Her face was a mix of worry, disbelief and fear as she witnessed with her own hazel eyes the truth of Persona's words. Her body was wet from the rain and she was panting after running all the way to the hospital. Even when she arrived in front of the room she still refused to believe everything that Persona told her, the fact that Natsume and the others kept Ruka's condition a secret from her, while she was the only one that could save him. It angered and saddened her at the same time. "Ruka-pyon!" Her eyes began to glisten with tears as she hastily made her way towards Ruka, ignoring the two Senpais who watched her in shock.

She took a place beside the hospital bed and her eyes widened to see her dearest friend was struggling with his life. His body was covered with horrible black marks that reminded her at the time when she had also experienced the same thing. It was a memory of being on the verge of death that she'd want to forget so much and still haunted her in some of her dreams. Now it looked as if her nightmares had come to life in front of her eyes. "Ruka-pyon…" When she heard Ruka moaned in pain, by instinct she took his hand from under the blanket and grasped it tightly as if it could help him to ease away the pain. She didn't understand what Persona meant by saying she's the only one that could save Ruka, but the proof that she survived his Alice before showing that there must be something she could do, and if she really had such power inside, she prayed, let her save Ruka with it.

Mikan could feel some kind of warm energy flowing inside through her hands into Ruka as she saw his face beginning to relax a bit and his body wasn't as tense as before. Whatever she was trying to do, it worked. But Tonouchi quickly realized what Mikan was doing and he abruptly grabbed Mikan's wrist and pulled her away from Ruka, breaking their contact. "No!" Mikan protested. She tried to squirm out of Tonouchi's grasp. "Let me go! Let me go Senpai! I can save Ruka-pyon." Her words only made Tonouchi tighten his grip and he placed his arm around Mikan to keep her from using her Alice any further.

"No, Mikan!" His Kouhai still struggled to free herself. Tears running down her face. "Listen to me!"He turned her body to face him. "Don't do it, okay? No matter what, you shouldn't use your Alice to heal Ruka."

"What do you mean?" She squealed. "Ruka-pyon is dying Senpai! Why didn't any of you tell me about this?" She looked at Tonouchi and Subaru in turn.

"Sakura," Subaru stood up. "Who told you that Ruka is in the hospital?"

"Eh? Well, Pe-Persona came to me and he—"

Tonouchi banged his fist to the wall beside him. "That damn bastard! He'll do anything to make sure his plan works out."

"What plan?" Mikan asked.

Subaru sighed. "It's not like we want to hide this matter from you Sakura, but as you can see, Persona's trying to lure all of us into his sick game. If you fell into his trap and absorb his Alice out of Ruka's body then he wins. Your action will proof the existence of your second Alice and he'll have enough reasons to drag you to the Elementary School Principal, and you'll also be transferred into Dangerous Ability Class."

"I-I have a second Alice?" Mikan said in disbelief.

"Yes, and a very rare one. The Stealing Alice. You have awoken its power when you almost died from Persona's Alice before. We had to keep it a secret from you for the same reason."

"But, if it's true then I really can save Ruka-pyon. Even if I have to join the Dangerous Ability I don't care! Please let me heal him, Senpai. If we don't do anything Ruka-pyon will—" Mikan didn't finish her sentence.

"I understand your feelings, Mikan." Tonouchi said, putting his hands on her shoulders. "It's not like we're going to do nothing. We have to trust everything to that person who cares about the two of you the most. Right now he's trying really hard to save Ruka so that your power won't fall into the Elementary School Principal's hands."

Mikan's eyes grew wide. The Fire Alice appeared in her mind. "Natsume. Where is Natsume?"

"He and Tsubasa went to the Academy Headquarters to get the Alice stone of Yuka Azumi, the woman who had the same Alice as you, which was hidden inside the Elementary School Principal's office. That's the only way we can save Ruka without using your ability."Subaru answered.

"What?"

"Don't worry Mikan." Tonouchi added. He knew his Kouhai would freak out if she found out Natsume was doing such a dangerous thing. "We've planned everything. The principal is currently not in the Academy so it'll be easier for them to sneak in and take the stone. Beside, Tsubasa is with him so I'm sure he'll be fine."

"But, Natsume—" No wonder Natsume acted strange yesterday. She understood that he wanted to protect her. But still, he should've just told her about something as important as this instead of keeping it all to himself, for God's sake. Mikan was frustrated but now that they're gone there's nothing she could do. As Tono-senpai said they could only trust him. He and Tsubasa-senpai would surely come back safely. Natsume always came back from all of his missions, right? So this would be no different, she tried assuring herself.

"Mikan, you should go back to the dorm now. It's already late. Leave Ruka to us. I promise you everything will be fine by the time you open your eyes tomorrow morning." Tono put up a smile to convince her.

Mikan shook her head. "Please let me stay here Senpai. I want to wait for Natsume."

"Well, that's…" Tonouchi turned to Subaru, cueing him to response in his place.

"If that's what she wants then just let her stay. After all, she already knows everything. But we still don't know how your Stealing Alice works Sakura, and we don't want you to accidentally use it on Ruka. So if you really want to be here I have to ask you to wait in the hallway."

"But!" She complained. However when she looked at Subaru's eyes she kept quiet and knew it'd be best to listen to him. "Fine." She glanced one more time at Ruka and with slumped shoulders Mikan walked out the hospital room.

* * *

Tsubasa groaned as he touched the back of his head and felt something wet and sticky on his hand. The moment Natsume pushed him he fell and hit his head on the floor really hard that he thought he had cracked his skull. When he opened his eyes and tried to move he felt dizzy and disoriented, but apart from the concussion he was fine. His body was heavy, and it took a moment to realize that Natsume was still lying on top of him. "Natsume, are you okay?" He shook his body gently. Natsume didn't show any sign of response. Instead he could feel his body was trembling above him. Tsubasa became tense and panic rose within him in an instant as he quickly got up to check on Natsume. He slowly rolled him onto his back and was shocked to see Natsume looked much paler than before. Deep pain etched upon his face while his two hands pressed tightly against the gunshot wound on his left side. His shirt slowly soaked with his precious blood.

"No…" Tsubasa stared in agonizing disbelief. His mind went numb from shock and regret that Natsume had taken the bullet for him. If he had been more careful, things like this wouldn't happen. He wanted to kill himself badly for that, but at the moment all he could hear was the voice of their attacker behind him saying over and over.

"The Black Cat is down. I repeat, the Black Cat is down. Send more men inside now to capture them at once."

**A/N:** To be continued. He he. At first I wanted to conclude the searching for Yuka's Alice Stone into one chapter only but in the end it became too long so I had to finish this chapter here. Please love and review to give me a boost to write the next chapter faster. XD


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: **Chapter seven is here! Sorry it took me so long to update because I've been busy with some other stuff lately. Thank you for those who have patiently waited for my updates. As always, enjoy the story and please let me know what you think.

CHAPTER 7

All Natsume could feel was pain. A burning, aggravating pain that tore through his side. In that one moment when he hurled himself between Tsubasa and the gun he immediately felt the strong penetrating pressure from the bullet forcing its way in to his abdomen, ripping through his flesh, and then the pain started to spread from there. It was almost unbearable. He lost himself for a moment and battled a wave of panic when he noticed the continuous stream of blood slowly soaking his clothes. It was hard for him to regain his senses in the midst of the mind-shattering agony but his hands reached to the source of the blood and started pressing it. His breathing became rough and his eyes fluttered closed. It was hurting like hell but the pressure was necessary to stop the bleeding. He was crying out inside his head but a slight whimper was all he managed to let out.

Natsume had seen many gunshot wounds and he knew the projectile that pierced through his body hit nowhere near critical. He'd survive if the bleeding stopped and if he could overcome the shock that followed after, but still, the pain was too overwhelming. His clothes were wet and his backside was numb with cold. Why is it so cold? He began to shiver.

He had almost passed out when somebody grabbed him by his shoulders and shook his body. "Natsume! Natsume!" That person called his name over and over but he couldn't open his eyes to see who it was. Stop it. Why wouldn't he just let him sleep? It hurt so much. He wanted to rest. He wanted to have a break from this tormenting feeling. Was that too much to ask?

After a while, that person seemed to have no intention of stopping what he's doing so finally Natsume succumbed to the tenacity and opened his eyes. First thing he saw was Tsubasa, looking extremely worried. His blue eyes welled up with tears.

"You're…annoying…" Natsume struggled with each word, his voice faltering.

"Natsume! Thank God! I thought I lost you." He finally stopped shaking him. "The bullet hit you."

"…I can see it…moron." A groan escaped his lips. "Your face…so ugly…You think I'm gonna die just because of thi—" That was all it took for Natsume to choke on his last word and coughed up some blood from his mouth. After he'd done he shut his eyes again exhaustedly.

"Natsume!" Fear washed over Tsubasa once again. "Stay with me, okay? Please stay awake. You can't lose your consciousness. You'll be alright soon, I promise." He could see Natsume made a slight nod with his head but his breathing became shallow, which was definitely not good. Tsubasa tried to remove Natsume's bloodied hands from his stomach but they stiffened and tensed the moment he touched them. "It's okay Natsume. I'm just going to assess your wound for a second." Natsume reluctantly let go of his grasp so Tsubasa could take a closer look at the wound. Surprisingly it was only a small hole above his pelvis but he knew the bullet that entered Natsume's body could've actually causing more internal damage than what could be seen from the outside. Moreover blood still hasn't stopped flowing out of his body. Natsume had to be taken to the hospital before he lost too much blood, or else he's not going to make it. And for the meantime, he needs something more than just hands to stop the bleeding. Tsubasa quickly took off his jacket and pressed it as hard as he could against the wound. Natsume winced from the sudden pressure. "Sorry. I know it hurts but it's better than using your hands—"

_CLICK._

Tsubasa stopped talking when he heard the sound behind him.

"Stand up, kid." The voice said.

Tsubasa turned to see the guard who shot Natsume had now pointed the same gun to his head. The panic that tugged his brain had made him completely forgot their enemy was still standing behind them. But with the gun aimed to his head, he could do nothing but obey the man. He positioned Natsume's hands on top of his jacket and told him to apply pressure to it before he slowly stood up and raised both hands.

"Good. Actually I was targeting you instead of the Black Cat but I guess this'll do either way. Now, if you want to save your friend you better surrender yourself to us. You don't want him to die here, do you?" He threatened. "If you don't fight back and let us capture you I'll make sure he'll be sent to the Academy Hospital straight away. But if you refuse, I can't guarantee his life. The decision's on you."

"You're not allowed to kill us." Tsubasa said carefully.

"Oh, the principal actually ordered us to try not to kill you but the highest priority is to not let you get away, especially since we know you're trying to steal something from here. Why do you think he let us use our guns if we're not allowed to kill you?" The guard smiled menacingly. "As I said, the decision's on you."

_They're all insane._ —Tsubasa thought. But he knew the guard's not lying. Kuonji was indeed the kind of man capable of killing anyone, even his allies for his own sake. Tsubasa glanced over his shoulder at Natsume whose eyes were half closed now. He tried to stay awake but he wouldn't last long. Their mission has failed. Even if they got the Alice stone he didn't see any way out from here, not with Natsume's condition like that. What should he do? He didn't have much time to choose. The guard had offered him to take Natsume to the hospital so should he stop fighting back and just let himself get caught in exchange for saving Natsume's life? He had made a promise to himself and Mikan that he wouldn't let anything happen to him. "I…" He hesitated.

Natsume was already near unconsciousness, but when he heard Tsubasa was about to break down and give up on their mission; he opened his eyes and with trembling hand he grabbed his ankle. "No…" He said weakly. "We need Yuka's stone…for Ruka."

"Natsume…"

"Come on Black Cat. Don't need to make this even harder on you."The guard coaxed. Using his head, he pointed at the only exit in the room which was still burning with fire that prevented anyone from getting in. Natsume's fire. "You really are a monster, aren't you? I can't believe you still have the strength to use your Alice after being severely injured like that. No wonder you're his favorite. That desperate effort of yours might slow us down but it'll soon be over once the other guard teleported into this room. There's no way you can escape from us now, anyway."

"Not if I burn you down first!" Natsume sent a menacing glare at the guard and he tried to light another flame to prove his threat. _Let the enemies feel your pain_ – Persona's words rang inside his head. But he felt lightheaded and instead of burning the man, the fire he created exploded a vase on the table beside his target. The pain had made him unable to focus on his Alice. Natsume bitterly laid his head back as he heard him laughed at his vain effort.

Tsubasa snapped. "Stop it Natsume! Don't use your Alice anymore!" He knew it was pointless. Natsume wouldn't listen to him. Instead, when he turned around he was aghast to see the look on Natsume's face. He was clearly dwelling in an excruciating pain but despite it all his eyes reflected an unbreakable resoluteness that was enough to prove his strong will to fight. For him this wasn't over yet. But how could he be that strong? Tsubasa knew the very reason he couldn't give up was because of Ruka and he'd probably fight till the last drop of his blood for his friend, but has he ever thought of putting his own life first rather than others? He should've known that his life worth just as equal as Ruka's. There're people who'd be sad if something happened to him. But then again, as long as somebody like Persona or Kuonji still exists in this Academy, Natsume will always risk his life to protect them. That thought pissed Tsubasa so much that he didn't know what's right or wrong anymore. All he kept saying in his head was he wouldn't let Natsume or Ruka die, and he'd use whatever small chances he had to prevent that. "I'm sorry, Natsume…" Tsubasa muttered as he stared downcast and raised his hands higher in surrender. "You're right. I give up."

"Tsubasa…you stupid…" Natsume panted heavily.

The guard grinned. "Smart choice." Still pointing the gun, he walked closer towards Tsubasa. "I would've done the same if I were you. You're the new member of DA right? I don't know what you're after, but breaking into the principal's office is the most foolish thing that student like you could do. You've purchased your own ticket to hell, kid. After this your life in this Academy will never be the same. Soon, you'll wish you've never lived."

Still looking down, Tsubasa watched the footsteps that were drawing closer to him. _One…two…three…_ He counted until the guard stood right in front of him before lifting his head. "Maybe you're right. But you're going to regret this before I do." He looked at him with a new determination in his eyes.

"What?" The guard made a confused look with his face. But the moment he realized something was wrong it was already too late. No matter how much he tried he couldn't move his body. It felt as heavy as a rock. "What is this?!"

"You haven't learned anything have you?" Tsubasa smirked. "I've been waiting for you to fall for my trap. Don't you know what my Alice can do? You should've been more careful before you got too close to me."

"You, Fucking Bastard!" His hands were shaking as the man tried his last effort to pull the trigger of the gun which was still aimed towards Tsubasa, but he was prepared for that. Tsubasa grabbed the guns barrel by wrapping his hand around it and easily twist it away from his direction as he delivered a roundhouse kick to the chest and swept his elbow blasting to the guard's nose."That, for shooting my friend." He said. The kick should've sent him rolling to the ground but Tsubasa's Alice kept his body standing straight. He punched the guard on the face once again with all his strength. "And that for pissing me off." As soon as he let go of the shadow the guard fell and sprawled on the floor. Tsubasa took the gun from him. Still, that alone wouldn't be enough to get them out of this place.

"Uurrgh…"

"Natsume!" He rushed to Natsume who had been trying to get up, but as soon as he got to his feet he wobbled under his own weight and sank against the plain wall, groaning in pain. "You shouldn't move." Tsubasa kneeled down beside him. Natsume's breathing was heavy and labored. Cold sweat ran down his face and he bit his lower lip in struggle to control himself from screaming or thrashing around in pain. "Don't worry. I won't let them catch us, so just lie still okay? I'll find a way to get us out of here."

Natsume didn't answer. He couldn't open his mouth without letting the scream took over. It was becoming more and more agonizing. He reached under his shirt for his healing stone, but then he noticed something's missing. Mikan's Alice Stone. He remembered he had it with him a moment ago. But it's not there. It must've fallen off from the necklace when he saved Tsubasa earlier. Not wanting to lose Mikan's stone, for the first time he was distracted from the pain and his gaze swept rapidly around the room looking for it. Fortunately he soon saw it lying on the floor not far from the place where they fell. It was easily spotted because the stone was emitting some kind of bright yellow light around it. Natsume had never seen any Alice stone that shine like that. It was different from the dim glow that usually appeared if the stone is being used. He pointed his finger and Tsubasa followed his direction until he saw the stone.

"What is that?" Tsubasa asked. He walked closer to have a good look at the stone. "Isn't this Mikan's Nullification stone?" How could they not see it before? The light emitting from the stone seemed familiar to him. He remembered he had seen something like that before. Where was it? As he tried to jog his memory he took the stone in his hands but then immediately felt a strong magnet-like force from it. The stone was heavy as if there's some kind of invisible force attracting it to the ground. But there's nothing in there.

"Wait a minute." Tsubasa recalled something. Since he was transferred to DA and started doing missions he was usually asleep from exhaustion during most of the lessons in the class but there was one lesson where Misaki had smacked him on the head and told him to stay awake. The teacher was explaining about Alice stones and he brought two samples which were his and his sister's. They were just an ordinary Flying and Telekinesis stones. But when he held them together, the stones began to shine very bright and stuck to each other as if they were made from magnets of opposite poles. Later the teacher explained that if two Alice stones had a high level of compatibility with each other or in more common cases belonged to two people related closely by blood then if they're brought close enough, they could feel each other's presence and it would likely cause the electrons inside the stone to spin in the same direction and creating a magnetic field around, hence producing a strong force of attraction between them. It wasn't a rule that's supposed to apply in general science but Alice stones were mystical after all.

Later all the girls in the class went crazy about it because there were also myth that you could find your soul mate using this method. Tsubasa had never tried it before, of course. He thought it was lame just like the other Alice Academy myths, even though he felt Misaki stole a couple glance at him after the lesson. But if it's true then there could be something in here.

Tsubasa took out a penknife from his pocket and began to gouge the hardwood floor right at one end of the board where Mikan's Alice stone was attracted. The grooves became more apparent as he slipped his knife to the small gap and easily lifted the whole part of the board, revealing a small hidden compartment underneath. He never imagined that there's something like that in the room, as if shelves full of Alice stones wasn't surprising enough. Did the ESP build it on purpose? There was nothing in there but a beautiful jewelry box made of crystal with an Alice stone sitting inside of it. Tsubasa took the box out and looked at it closely. It was unmistakably the stone they're looking for. It had the same color as what Principal Yukihara described and was shining even brighter now. It definitely reacted to Mikan's stone. How's that possible? What's the relation between Mikan and that woman named Yuka? Could it be because they had the same Alice?

"…Tsubasa?" Natsume called him. He had his back to him the whole time so Natsume couldn't see what he was doing. Still kneeling, he lifted the box for Natsume to see with a smile on his face. "I found Yuka's Alice stone. It was hidden under the floor this whole time." Tsubasa said.

Relief poured through Natsume as he heard that. "That's good." He said. With this, Ruka could be saved. The only remaining problem was how to get them out of here with the stone. He tilted his head to the door. He could barely maintain his Alice anymore and once the fire died down or the guard teleported into the room they'd be done for. Maybe he could force their way out with his fire. But did he still have enough strength left to do it? Even without the gun shooting him he already felt worn out and exhausted. Even so it's not like they had other choice and whether it'll work or not he could still try it as their last effort.

The throbbing pain on his side made him felt woozy. He looked down to his body and saw blood. Lots of blood. When was the last time he bled this much? Oh, yes. It was three years ago, when he was still new to the missions. He was assign on an escort mission along with a boy which was a year older from him and a female senior. Their objective was to deliver a top secret document from the Academy to the government. The female senior drove the car while the two of them sat on the back. Usually a mission like this was supposed to be quite safe. But a bunch of strangers riding motorcycles started chasing and attacking them and in the end causing their car to crash on a hill. The boy didn't survive the crash. He died right on the spot. It was the first death that Natsume witnessed with his own eyes.

He remembered when he placed the boy's head on his lap to comfort him, and later the look he had on his face the moment before he closed his eyes forever haunted Natsume for months. The accident was probably what triggered his PTSD. No matter how many times he washed and rubbed he could never get rid of the feeling of the boy's thick red blood on his hands. But because of the shock, his injuries didn't hurt one bit at that time. He's just beginning to realize how bad his condition was after the doctor treated him in the hospital.

Natsume held the healing stone tightly above his chest. The stone felt hot as if it was fighting hard to heal all his injuries and almost lost the battle. Mikan's Alice stone was also going to run out of power soon. They're on their own now. No one's going to come and help them. Natsume's vision became a blur, but he could still recognize Tsubasa when he was about to walk back to him, waving the stone in his hand. Suddenly without any warning a large group of Fuukitai and ESP's guards appeared right behind Tsubasa.

"Shit!" Tsubasa turned back to face the enemies, pointing the gun he stole at them. But they were just too many and he alone couldn't possibly beat them all.

"The Elementary School Principal will be arriving soon. Drop your weapon and surrender." A guard who stood at the front told him.

"So that man can capture and torture us? No way in hell I'll surrender myself to you guys."

"Natsume Hyuuga, the Black Cat and Tsubasa Andou, a shadow manipulation Alice. As long as you're still in this Academy there's no way you can escape from the principal. A severe punishment is what awaits you for causing a commotion like this."

"You have to catch us before that." Tsubasa said as he pulled the gun's safety off. "I'll shoot anyone who takes a step closer!"

Natsume's body slumped even more to the ground. He could barely hear their conversation, as if they were talking in a room next to him. In his lightheadedness, the sound of his ragged breath was the only sign telling him that he's alive. Even though Tsubasa needed his help, he couldn't find the strength to move his body. The fire at the entrance was getting weaker and weaker and he decided to let it went out as maintaining it would be no use to them anymore. They're already pushed to the corner, after all. He could hear the footsteps of more guards storming in. When he forced his eyes open, he could see the enemies were pointing their guns at Tsubasa, ready to attack if he made any offensive moves. No one seemed to be looking at his direction. Is it really over just like this? After they're so close of saving Ruka? No. Even if it's just Tsubasa, he could still get him out of here with his fire. He still had little strength left, thanks to the healing stone.

But at that moment Natsume noticed something was lying near his feet. Another Alice stone. It wasn't there before. Could it be the stone that fell from one of the broken jars and was accidentally kicked towards him when the rest of the guards entered the room? The stone had an aquamarine color in it and Natsume knew exactly what kind of Alice it stored. No. Way. He blinked his eyes a couple times as he couldn't believe what he saw. Even if it's just a coincidence, it's still too good to be true. It's like his luck of a lifetime spent for just the right stone they need to appear so suddenly within his reach. This could be their ticket out of here. How foolish of him to not realize this much earlier. Of course, his mind was so occupied on finding Yuka's Alice stone before that he hadn't thought of using the Alice stones in the room to escape. He didn't want to waste any second so he quickly grabbed the Aquamarine stone while making sure that no one paid attention to his movement, before he activated the power and used it to teleport right beside Tsubasa.

Everyone including Tsubasa was startled to see him appearing instantaneously right in the middle of them. Taking advantage of the confusion, Natsume used his last strength to create wall of fire that isolated both of them from the guards. His frail body was aching and screaming but the adrenaline rush overpowered all the pain and he stood on his ground. With only a few seconds that he had he grabbed Tsubasa's arm and teleported from that accursed room, smirking as he left the trace of his fire and all the guards who had their mouths hung open but couldn't do anything to stop them.

* * *

It's been nearly half an hour since Mikan anxiously waited outside Ruka's hospital room. She felt tired and sleepy, and she did everything she could think of to keep her eyes open. She had paced back and forth around the area for God knows how many times, she'd tried to talk to other patients passing by, she'd put her ear to the keyhole to listen to what Subaru and Tonouchi might be saying even though silence was all she got. Seemed like they knew when she tried to eavesdrop their conversation and then they would stop talking every time. And last in her frustration Mikan even thought of going to the third floor to visit Kaname-Senpai. But she gave up the idea and instead she went over to the vending machine at the end of the hallway to buy some coffee.

Mikan sighed as she inserted the Rabbit coins into the vending machine. Actually she'd prefer milk or juice rather than a can of hot black coffee, but right now she could really use some caffeine to help her stay awake. As soon as she heard the news about Ruka being hospitalized she couldn't think of anything else and when she realized it her feet already brought her to the hospital building. She hadn't contacted Hotaru or anybody in the dorm either. They must be worried about her right now. But she didn't want to leave, not until Natsume returned and she made sure that Ruka's already escaped from death's door.

Somehow, she felt more concerned about Natsume rather than Ruka. After getting to know Natsume over the year, she noticed that Natsume has always had some kind of impulse inside himself to shoulder all the responsibility whenever he was given the chance even though it was more than he could handle. And what made it worse was he almost never knew when to stop that he ended up pushing himself way too far sometimes. It seemed that he always found a way to make other people, especially her, worry so much about him to the extent that she wished she could just tie him up and lock him in a room. Still, even that wouldn't be able to stop a Natsume Hyuuga.

Mikan brought three cans of coffee from the machine. She thought of giving them to Subaru and Tonouchi as well because they must already be more exhausted than her for looking after Ruka the whole day. Beside she could use the excuse to enter the room and take a look at Ruka's condition while she's inside. But when she was about to head back, from the distance she noticed a crowd of people wearing white (the hospital's staffs) swarmed right outside Ruka's room. Did something happen while she was gone? Panic stirred her as she darted across the hall as fast as she could to see what's causing the hustle. Her head filled with countless worst possibilities she could think of as she was getting nearer, and she could see the door to Ruka's room was still closed which relieved her a bit. But when she arrived, her pupils narrowed as she witnessed something that surpasses every nightmare she ever had in any of her dreams. To her horror in front of the room, Natsume was lying helplessly on a stretcher, blood soaking all over his clothes.

Everything was moving so fast and at the same time slow for Mikan. Her whole attention was directed to Natsume's face; so pale as if all colors have been drained from him. He was sweating heavily, strands of hair sticking to his forehead. He had his eyes closed and brows knitted in pain. He looked really suffering. The nurses went back and forth around Natsume, checking on his pulse and blood pressure while another placing an oxygen cannula in his nose. Then she noticed Tsubasa on one side of the stretcher, talking frantically to a doctor who's trying to cut Natsume's bloodied shirt and the old bandages that covered his body, only to reveal more blood. The doctor quickly applied hemostatic gauze and direct pressure to his left side to stop the bleeding. Natsume groaned as his whole body was shivering.

Mikan's eyes swelled with tears at the heart-rending sight._ No. This can't be happening_ – She covered her mouth with her hand. "Natsume!" Mikan hurriedly approached them and took a place beside Tsubasa.

"Mikan?" Tsubasa startled by her presence.

* * *

Pain. The searing pain that Natsume felt around his abdomen was getting worse after what he did to escape from the principal's secret chamber. His chest has also started pounding wildly as the effect of his Alice. It was burning hot where the wound was, but everything else's icy cold. He felt so numb that he didn't even know he was shivering. His last thought was to get both him and Tsubasa out of the place with the Teleportation stone and they appeared right in front of Ruka's room as he couldn't risk of teleporting inside and making Ruka see his condition. When he knew they had made it, his consciousness faded quickly as he heard all noises of people talking around him, but one particular voice that cried his name had made him wanted to open his eyes badly. Natsume could recognize that voice anywhere, the one he longed so much to hear. But she couldn't possibly be here. Was he dreaming it?

He struggled to open his heavy eyelids and when they finally opened he saw Mikan. It was really her. But why's she in the hospital? As far as he knew she's supposed to be sleeping inside her room right now, not seeing him like this, bathed in his own blood.

"You shouldn't be here…Polka Dots." Natsume said hoarsely.

"Natsume!" Mikan took his hand and squeezed it lightly. "You idiot! What have you done to get yourself hurt this bad?" Tears fell down her cheeks.

Natsume's crimson eyes met Mikan's hazel. _Mikan's crying again._ –Natsume thought. _Why do I always make her cry? I love you. Please don't make that face._ He parted his mouth. "I'll be…fine." He squeezed Mikan's hand in return as a proof then turned his gaze at Tsubasa. "Take the Alice stone…to Ruka." He said to him. "And when he's awake, don't tell him about me…or how we get the stone… I don't want him…to blame himself…"

Tsubasa nodded. "I…I promise. I also won't tell a thing to Ruka, so please Natsume. You have to live through this."

Natsume didn't answer. His eyes slowly closed and Mikan could feel his hand's slipping away from her grasp. "Natsume!" Mikan cried. She realized that Natsume's body was so cold.

"The patient's blood pressure is low at 80 over 40, pulse is weak, and he's experiencing a rapid heartbeat." A nurse stated.

"It's not good. He's entering hypovolemic shock." The doctor said. "Rush him to the ER and put him straight into the level I trauma center." He told the nurses and the stretcher started moving. Tsubasa and Mikan followed them without letting go of Natsume's hand.

"There's no exit wound, so the bullet must still lodged inside. We may need to prepare for surgery. Fetch me Natsume Hyuuga's medical records." One of the nurses nodded and left.

"Bullet?" Mikan was flabbergasted.

The doctor looked at her. "Yes. He was shot on his left side. Between the ribcage and pelvis. Luckily he had been applying pressure to his own wound so the bleeding is still categorized as controllable. But considering he hasn't healed properly from his last injuries and with all the damage his Alice had caused to his body, we still can't say anything for sure."

They reached the Emergency Room and Mikan had to let go of her hand when Natsume went inside with all the staff. She wanted to follow but a nurse held her back. "I'm sorry but you can't go inside." She said.

"Will Natsume be okay?" Mikan sniffled.

"We'll do everything we can to save him. For the meantime, please wait outside." The nurse closed the door, leaving Mikan and Tsubasa in the corridor.

Everything became so quiet. The only sound came from Mikan's sobbing cry which she had been trying to stop but tears kept falling from her eyes. Something, something deep down her heart was aching to the painful truth that Natsume's dying in front of her eyes. She didn't move at all from where she stood. All she wanted was to make sure that Natsume's going to be alright.

"Mikan…"

"Tsubasa!"

They turned around to see Tonouchi running towards them. "When did you come back? I heard a commotion from outside and saw you guys heading to the Emergency Room. Has something happened?" Mikan's red swollen eyes caught his attention. "Mikan, are you crying?" None of them answered his questions but Tonouchi took the hint and figured right away what the tense's all about. He toned down his voice. "Natsume's inside, isn't he?"

"It's all my fault." Tsubasa, looking shaken, started to say.

"Senpai?"

"I'm sorry Mikan. Natsume got shot because he tried to protect me. If only he didn't do that, then definitely—"

"Definitely you'd be the one lying in there right now." Tonouchi cut in. "And what difference would it make? Do you think Mikan would be glad if you're the one who got shot instead of Natsume? What about Misaki and other people who care so much about you?" He sighed. "I know how you feel. But you mustn't blame yourself over what's already happening Tsubasa. Beside, you're quite beaten up yourself. "

"I'm okay." He denied.

"Still, your arm's bleeding. You should get a doctor to treat your injuries."

"I said I'm fine."

"Tono-senpai is right, senpai." Mikan rubbed tears from her cheeks. "I don't want anything to happen to you too."

Tsubasa sighed. "If you say so, Mikan."

"Oh." She remembered. "How is Ruka's condition? We have to take the Stealing Alice Stone to him."

"Yeah, you're right." Tsubasa took the box out from his pocket. "But how do you know about all this Mikan?" He squinted and sent an accusing look at Tono.

"It was Persona who told her." Tonouchi clarified.

"That son of a—"

The ER's door suddenly opened. A nurse came out and approached them. Mikan could feel her muscles became tense again. "How's Natsume?" She asked almost fearfully.

"May I ask what's your relationship with him, Miss?"

"We're in the same class. He's my partner." Mikan answered hastily.

The nurse nodded. "He had the potential of going into an arrest but we managed to stabilize his condition for now."

"You mean a cardiac arrest?" Tonouchi intervened. "He's only twelve!"

"It's one of the symptoms of Alice disease." She explained. "His Alice is the fourth type and apparently he's been using it a lot that he's already in the late intermediate stage of the disease. So we're dealing with more than just the gunshot wound. But now that he's stable an OR is prepped and he needs blood transfusion immediately. We're still trying to find more donors as his blood type is very rare. It's a B-negative, and our current supply is insufficient. So if any of you know someone with the same blood type please informs us."

"Take mine." Mikan said abruptly. "I'm also a B-negative." She recalled when their class was having health examination about two months ago. She almost felt like she was about to faint when the doctor drew some of her blood to be tested, but it was paid off when they told her that she's perfectly healthy and that her blood type's one of the rarest. And she's willing to give them as much as needed to save Natsume.

"Well then, will you please come this way with me, miss?" The nurse guided.

"Senpai, please make sure to use the Alice stone on Ruka." Mikan said before she left.

"Leave that to me." Tonouchi said. "Tsubasa, you should also come with them to get your injuries treated."

Tsubasa nodded and after he handed the Alice stone to Tonouchi, he followed Mikan and the nurse down the stairs while Tonouchi went back to Ruka's room with the stone which Natsume had risked his life to get in his hand.

* * *

_At the Headquarters:_

The ESP had returned to his office along with Rui and Yakumo and when they arrived, they found the room in total chaos. A broken chair lay on its side in the corner. Papers and shattered glass scattered all around the room and a couple of scorch marks were visible on the wall. Some of the guards sprawled unconscious on the floor and some stuck helplessly on shadow traps. "Oh, my." Rui put one hand on his waist and the other over his mouth as he stood in the doorway, watching all the mess.

"P-principal!" A guard came running.

"Where are they?"

"Forgive us. The intruders have escaped."

"What?" His pupils constricted in anger, Kuonji stormed passed his henchman furiously across the room to the charred door behind his desk. He went inside, ignoring all the remaining guards in the room and headed straight to where he hid Yuka's Alice stone. Just as he had feared, the stone's gone. His face turned red as rage boiling in his blood. He growled as he took one of the jars from the shelf behind him and threw it to the group of guards and Fuukitai near the door. It hit them and fell to the floor, broken in pieces. "YOU USELESS PIECE OF GARBAGE! I'VE TOLD YOU TO NOT LET THEM GET AWAY!" He shouted in immense fury that sent some of his henchmen to take a step backward. They had never seen him this mad, not since Yuka Azumi inserted something in his body that's causing him to be trapped in his child-like form.

Kuonji clenched his jaw. "Those imbecile brats!" He threw another jar to the floor. "How dare they steal from me. I'll make them pay dearly for this!" He scowled at them. "Tell Persona to find them and bring them to me! NOW!"

* * *

_Meanwhile at the High School Principal Office:_

There was a knock at the door."It's me."

"Yes." Principal Yukihara answered. "Come in."

The door swung open and a Fuukitai walked inside. "I'm here to report that Natsume Hyuuga and Tsubasa Andou have successfully escaped from the ESP's office with Yuka Azumi's Alice stone."

"I see." The principal turned the paper he's been reading. "So they did find the stone."

"Yes."

"Are they both fine?"

"I believe that Tsubasa Andou's fine, but Natsume had been shot by a guard by the time I got there. They're all in the hospital now so I guess he'll be alright."

Principal Yukihara looked up. "It's all thanks to you. You're the one who secretly gave the Teleportation Alice stone to Natsume and helped them escape from there."

The Fuukitai's lips curved into a small smile. "No need to thank me. I just did as you ordered me to, principal. Besides, they're not out of peril yet. It's only a matter of time now before the Elementary School Principal catches them."

The principal exhaled deeply. "No matter what their reasons are, they've committed serious violation of the school rules, and since they're both part of the Dangerous Ability class managed by Kuonji, I cannot interfere on whatever punishments he decides to give them."

"I'm sure they're all well aware of that." The Fuukitai began rubbing his face with two hands.

"We've done enough for now. I want you to continue spying on the ESP and find out about any information we could use to bring him down."

"Understood." As he rubbed, his skin becoming more and more like clay and his facial feature slowly started to change until he became a completely different person. "Is there anything else?"

"That's all." Principal Yukihara stated as he watched the transformation. "You're dismissed. Once again, thank you for your hard work, Goshima." He said.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N**: Hi guys! Sorry for not updating in a long time and thanks for those who have been patiently waiting for this. Without further ado I present you chapter eight.

**CHAPTER 8**

It's already past midnight. Everything was deadly quiet in the room except for the monitor that was beeping constantly beside the hospital bed, displaying graphic of Natsume's now-stable heartbeat. The boy was still lying unconsciously with Mikan staying by his side, holding his hand. Despite the lateness of the hour, Mikan was still awake. She couldn't sleep properly for the past few days and insisted not to leave the hospital except for class. Everyone who also came to visit, teachers and seniors, kept telling her to go back and rest but gradually they gave up and let her stay in the end. It's her fifth night in here. And every night she wished to see again the crimson eyes of Natsume staring at her, but not once had he opened his eyes since that day they performed a surgery on him to remove the bullet from his body. He'd been in a coma since then.

She laid her head on the bed and concentrated on the beeping sound. The sound was the only reliever to Mikan, sign that Natsume was still breathing and alive, as well as the source of her fear because she knew no matter how normal everything looked right now, it all could go wrong in just a few seconds. Just like yesterday when she woke up hearing a long continuous beep and noticed the flat line on the monitor that shocked the hell out of her that she could just stand motionless at the corner when doctors and nurses rushed into the room, yelling the patient's had stopped breathing. They started doing chest compression on Natsume in turns and injecting adrenaline in his body, striving to bring him back to life. The quiet room suddenly turned into a total chaos.

With every second that passed Mikan became more frightened. She prayed and prayed with tears filling her eyes, begging for God not to take Natsume away from her. She realized she wouldn't be able to live without him, she loved him, and a world without Natsume would be meaningless. When seconds turned into minutes she thought she had already lost him, but then miraculously they noticed the regular jagged lines on the monitor had started again, much to everyone's relief.

The doctor made sure everything was fine and had started working again so they could loosen up a bit for now. But before they left, they warned her that this was his second cardiac arrest within a week and they weren't sure that Natsume's body would be able to handle more if next time another attack occurs so they needed her to pay a close attention to him and call them immediately for the slightest change. Narumi, who was also informed of this scrambled to the hospital in the middle of the night and just as he had worried, he found Mikan sitting in the corner of Natsume's room with her arms around her knees and burying her face, crying. She was shaking out of fear and still in shock because of what just happened that she didn't notice Narumi had entered the room. Narumi sighed. This kind of thing wasn't supposed to be witnessed by a twelve-year-old. To cap it off she was alone when that happened. The poor kid must've been so scared. He regretted for he left her to look after Natsume alone.

Narumi came closer to Mikan, giving a quick glance at Natsume when he walked pass his bed. He leaned towards Mikan and stroked her head gently. "Mikan-chan. Are you okay?"

Mikan lifted her head. Her eyes and nose were red from crying. "S-sensei…" She sniffled.

"Shh… It's okay, I'm here now. I already know what happened. You must be so scared Mikan-chan." Narumi wrapped his arms around Mikan. "But look, Natsume's alive, isn't he? It's alright now."

"B-but they said if something like this happened again they were not sure Natsume could survive. I'm scared. I don't want him to die, Sensei. I…"

Wiping away tears from her cheeks, Narumi slightly smiled at her. "Do you really think Natsume is that weak, Mikan-chan? He's been fighting for three years of his life and I know there's no way he's going to lose now. Especially now that he has you. Natsume has changed a lot since he met you. That's why you have to believe in him. He'll survive this and get back to us. I promise." He walked to a drawer, pulled it open and took out a blanket from there before he sat next to Mikan and wrapped their bodies in it. "I'm going to stay here with you tonight, is that okay?"

Mikan nodded. "Thank you, Sensei. I'm glad you're here with me." She stopped crying, and Narumi breathed a sigh of relief. Mikan chuckled between wiping away her tears.

"Is something funny?" He asked.

"No. But being like this makes me remember about that night when you let me stay in your room and sleep beside you. You know, when I tried to escape from the Academy to see Grandpa then Sensei came and saved me before I almost got kidnapped."

"Oh, yes. I remember. It surely feels like a long time already."

"Even though I didn't get to meet with Grandpa in the end, I was glad Sensei was there. Everyone said I shouldn't trust you but your hands that night was so gentle and kind, just like a father to me. You also kept your promise in the end by delivering my letter to Grandpa, so they all must be wrong about you." Narumi laughed nervously, uncertain whether he should be happy that Mikan regarded him as her father.

Mikan closed her eyes, picturing the memories in her mind. Everything was much simpler at that time, or was it? Just because she hadn't known about everything that Natsume went through back then doesn't mean it didn't actually happen. The only difference was now she was aware of it. Even before she came to the Academy, Natsume was already suffering in here. And he still is. Everyone, even Ruka said that she'd changed Natsume for the better and even saved him from the road of failure but Mikan couldn't see any of that. She didn't save anyone. Natsume still got hurt every time and all she could do was watch, only watch. And it got worse since her existence only added one more name to the list of people Natsume had to protect. He should've left this place with Aoi a long time ago! That's what he always wanted, wasn't it? He'd yearned for freedom for many years but when it came right in front of his eyes he proudly walked away from it. Guess what held him back. It's her. And now he's dying from trying to protect her too. Will this ever come to an end? They just wanted to have a normal life.

"What is it, Mikan-chan?" Narumi looked at her with concern eyes. "You're crying again."

"Huh?" Mikan didn't realize tears were beginning to fall from her eyes one more time. Narumi who saw that quickly put his arm around her, making her leaning to his side.

"There, there. Why don't you try to sleep? I'll watch over Natsume so you don't have to worry." He spoke softly, clearly taken the role of a father to comfort her.

"Sensei…"

"Yes?" He was stroking Mikan's hair gently when the question arises.

"When Natsume regained his consciousness, will Persona take him away…just like what he did to Tsubasa-senpai?

Narumi stopped his hand. From the moment her senior left he knew sooner or later Mikan would ask about this. "Hmm. Did he come again today?"

"He didn't come inside, but I caught him staring at Natsume from the window. It seems he didn't want to miss even just a day and the moment Natsume opened his eyes he wanted to be there so he could drag him straight to the Principal. He's not going to wait until he fully recovered, is he?"

"Well, about that, ehm, you don't have to worry. We'll figure something out okay? I promise I'll do everything to make sure nothing bad will happen to Natsume. So…" He heard a soft snoring. It seemed that Mikan had exhaustedly fallen asleep in his arms. It's good though. Just right in time. He wasn't sure he could give a satisfying answer to her question, and in this situation lying to her didn't seem right either. "Good night, Mikan-chan." Narumi planted a kiss on her forehead.

Nothing changed on the next day. Everybody who came had left, including Narumi. Mikan convinced him to leave because he didn't get to sleep at all yesterday and he did after she promised him she'd return to the dorm tomorrow morning to get her own rest. So tonight she was alone with Natsume again. She held Natsume's hand just like she did every night, talking to him sometimes, and telling him everything that happened in the class that day. Mikan was sure that Natsume could hear her.

"Ne, ne, Natsume. Listen. Today Koko and Kitsuneme pulled a prank on Permy again. They switched her perfume into an instant hair growth spray they bought from Central Town and when Permy used it her curly hair grew all over, even the hair in her nose too. It was so funny. Wish you could see it. She shrieked until Jin-jin came and told her to stay outside if she kept screaming like that so she had no choice but to keep quiet while cutting all the hair by herself. Well, after that Jin-jin gave us lots of homework of course, and as you can guess, I have no idea how to do it at all. I know you'd call me stupid but I just hate math. On the contrary you're good at it, aren't you?" No answer. "Maybe you should teach me next time." She was replied by silence.

Mikan stared at Natsume's face. She had almost broken down in tears. "Hey," Her voice was shaking. "When are you going to wake up? Haven't you been sleeping long enough already? Natsume. Open your eyes Natsume…" She buried her face in her hands, feeling hot tears began to run out of both of her eyes. "I love you, Natsume…"

* * *

Around him was black. Pitch-black darkness that was so solid and clouded by heavy atmosphere that he felt the weight was crushing him from every direction. It was even hard to breathe and he couldn't see anything. But despite it all he realized he was running in it. What was he running from? Or to? He couldn't remember. Each step was only getting heavier. It seemed that he had been running forever. He stopped, and when he did the crushing-weight was suddenly gone. Yeah, this felt good. No need to force himself to keep going anymore. It wouldn't get him anywhere after all. He'd been running in circle all this time, and now's the right time to step out of it. Finally he could just be an onlooker instead of a player in the world full of injustice and cruelty that was so sickening he didn't want to take part in it anymore.

To him this darkness was his mercy. And he welcomed it. He didn't have any regret. He'd done everything he could. Aoi was saved, and he could see her smile again for the last time. He'd fulfilled his promise, the reason why he came to the Academy. And Ruka, he'd find a way to manage without him. Ruka was surrounded by many good people and also had a promising future ahead of him. In one or two years he'd be forgotten and they all would be able to move on with their life again. Even if he wouldn't be included in their future, knowing that every sacrifice he'd made for them wasn't in vain was more than enough for him. And it's all over now.

Even so, there seemed to be something else bothering him. Something important. He wasn't sure what it was but it kept him from closing his eyes and letting the eternal darkness engulf his existence. He felt there's someone waiting for him. Who was that? Someone like the sun. Someone with a smile so bright that could erase any worry in his mind. Brown hair. Hazel eyes. He could almost see her face clearly if he concentrated but something warned him that once he remembered there's no turning back. Once he recalled her name this barrier that had been shielding him from every pain and misery would break and he wouldn't be able to escape from it. Did he once again want to deal with the overwhelming feeling of being trapped and the fear of losing? Was he once again willing to accept all the pain that made death sound like forgiveness? Or he could just choose to forget everything right now and let the living take care of their own problems. Now that he's not one of them it had nothing to do with him anymore. Nobody would blame him if he gave up now. After everything they would understand.

Well, it was an easy question and the answer to it was obvious. But suddenly the image of that girl crying flashed in his mind and for some reason it cracked something inside him. What's this feeling? And why was that girl crying? Was it because of him? Did he really mean that much too her? Deep in his heart he knew all the answers. This was the girl whose heart would break more than anyone if he's gone. This was the girl who needed his help more than anyone because there're people forcing her to walk the same path as he was. This was the girl who'd always wait for him to return and greet him with a smile despite all the bad things that happened to her. This was the girl who'd never back down and give up fighting for what she believes in no matter how scared she really was on the inside. And this was the girl who illuminated his path with her never-ending light; every reason he needed to open his eyes so he could see her face again. He wanted to see her. The girl he loved with all his heart. The reason for him to come back so she would never shed her tears anymore.

He got back to his feet and tried to run again, believing that every step he took would bring him closer to her. He ran and ran until his eyes caught a speck of light at the end of this void, his way back to her. Finally. Maybe he wasn't always running in the same circle all this time. Maybe there's an end even to infinity. But as soon as he started to move towards the light, everything in that place seemed to hold him down. Suddenly there were chains wrapped all over his body, restraining his every move and dragging him back into the abyss, swallowing him. No! No! He tried to scream but nothing came out. The light was getting further; soon he would completely lose the sight of it. He stretched out his hands desperately trying to reach but more chains materialized all over his body and he didn't have the power to break himself free from them.

_No! I want to live! Please let me live! Just one more time. I can't leave her, not like this. I want to see her smile again at least once. _But the darkness granted him no clemency. He's drowning in the mud of oblivion, his existence slowly being erased. Soon there'd be nothing left of him, not even a single trace of memory. He could barely move a finger now or even feel his body. In his numbness he could think of nothing but the girl. Strangely, within his clouded thought the image of her was only getting clearer, much like the sun which rays slowly penetrating the darkness. Before he disappears completely, he called out the only name echoing strongly in his head_._ _Mi…kan… I love you. I'm sorry Mikan. Mikan. Mikan! Mikan!_

"Mikan!"

Natsume's eyes jerked opened and he gasped.

What happened to him? Is he alive? Where's this place? He squinted to adjust his eyes to the harsh light that hung above his head. Still disoriented, he felt something around his face. He lifted his hand to remove the thing, an oxygen mask. A tube connected to multiple IV was inserted in his left hand and he realized he was wearing a johnny shirt. This must be the hospital. He recalled that he used his last power and the Alice stone to bring them to this place. But more than that, it means he's alive! He didn't remember if he ever felt any happier than this.

Natsume tilted his head and found Mikan sleeping soundly while sitting on a chair next to his bed. Has she been staying by his side all this time? Her sleeping face looked so much like an angel, and it brought a smile to his lips. But as if she could feel eyes staring at her, Mikan woke up and stood abruptly from her chair as she saw him. "Natsume!" She inched closer to him, and as if not believing her eyes she touched his face. "You're awake. You're awake!"

Natsume wanted to say something but when he opened his mouth a raspy grunt was all that came out. His mouth and throat felt so dry.

"Wait. I'll call the doctor." Mikan said and she scrambled outside the room. A minute later she returned with a man in white coat following behind her. Natsume tried to sit down and Mikan quickly helped him. He grimaced when moving his body became too painful.

"It's okay, Mr. Hyuuga. Just lie down." The doctor said, smiling at him. "I see you've regained your consciousness. It's quite surprising given the fact you still hadn't shown any progress the last time I monitored your condition. Let me examine you for a moment." He came closer and flashed a light into one of Natsume's eye then moved to the other one. "Do you remember what happened before you were brought here?" Natsume had to think for a while before he finally nodded. "Can you speak?"

Natsume swallowed to clear his throat. "Yes…"

The doctor looked at the ECG monitor and wrote something down on the clipboard in his hand then turned to Natsume again and began checking on his vital signs. When he'd done he asked, "Do you feel hurt somewhere?"

"My left side…"

"Ah. It's normal since you just underwent an emergency surgery to have the bullet removed from your abdomen. The pain will gradually become less with time. But just in case, I'll prescribe some light painkillers to help you with your recovery. I know you've been taking the strong ones so possibly this will have a slight or no effect at all on you but right now we can't afford anything too heavy as it'll just burden your body even more. Do you have any difficulty breathing?"

"Not really." Natsume answered. The doctor put a stethoscope around Natsume's chest and frowned slightly. "Take a deep breath." He asked. Natsume did but stopped halfway when he felt a sharp pain inside his chest. He tried not to let it show but that doctor must've noticed it. Damn. Even so he didn't say anything and to Natsume's relief he removed the stethoscope from his body.

"Okay, Mr. Hyuuga. Lastly, I'd like to take samples of your blood to be tested in our lab and after that we're done for now. Overall your body is at the best as it can be for a person who just came out of a coma but try not to move around too much or get out of the bed yet. You may experience dizziness, nausea and sore throat followed by a dry cough but the medications I'll prescribe should help minimizing that. We'll go with more details about your health after the results of your blood came out. Do you have any question before I leave?"

Natsume shook his head. He just wanted him to leave. The sooner the better. He's not going to say anything that would make this conversation last even longer, even though he wanted to know why he felt weaker than before. He wouldn't like the answer of course. While Mikan was already looking like someone had just dropped a bomb to her face that could explode at any moment, like she's waiting to hear her own death sentence and it was enough to discourage him from asking further. He couldn't let this doctor spill anymore than he should have in front of her, and he must've sensed it too. After finishing his job he left the room without saying a word and finally they were left alone again.

"Em," Mikan began. "Is it still hurt, Natsume?"

"A bit. But I'm feeling a lot better now that he's gone." He said dryly.

"Yeah, you must be tired. Just tell me if you need anything. Meanwhile you should rest."

"How long was I out?" Natsume asked, ignoring her telling him to rest. He had too many questions in his head and now that he'd just regained his consciousness he didn't plan on closing his eyes again anytime soon.

"Well, about a week." Mikan answered nervously.

A week! That was the longest he'd ever been unconscious. Looked like the surgery was no joke. "What about Ruka? Is he—"

"Oh, don't worry." She brightened up. "Ruka-pyon's fine. The Alice stone managed to absorb all Persona's Alice from his body and he even has returned to school three days ago. He kept asking about you, though."

"Tell me you didn't say anything to him."

"I didn't, of course." She said quickly. "When Ruka-pyon woke up, we decided to tell him that you've left for another mission and the reason he survived was because of Subaru-senpai's healing Alice. We didn't mention anything about the Alice stone. Luckily he believed in our story but he seemed so disappointed when he knew Persona had tricked him. Ruka-pyon really thought he could save you."

Natsume sighed, putting a finger on his forehead. "Look, I appreciate that he's trying to help me. But as you can see, it only makes things worse. It's not that I blame him, but I hope Ruka has learned a lot from this that no matter what he does, he won't be able to help me. No one can. And I never asked for any of you to help me either."

"But if we don't do something then you will—"

"I know."

"So why? Why are you treating this matter as if it's no big deal at all?" Mikan raised her voice.

"I don't. But what can I do? I don't see any other choice. All this time there was never one. Even if I take action and choose to escape from here to save my own life I won't be able to sleep at night knowing you, or Ruka, or anyone will be forced to take my place because I know more than anyone what it's like to be stripped of your freedom and dignity while at the same time realizing your dreams and hopes of the future are also being snatched away from you. I don't have the heart to give that kind of life to anyone so here I am. I decided to stay here to protect you as long as I can." He made his final statement, which of course was taken wrongly by her.

"So, it's all because of us. We're a burden to you." Mikan said looking hurt and guilty.

Damn. Natsume wished he could take back his words. He knew Mikan would get the wrong idea about it. "I don't mean it that way." He told her. This conversation wasn't supposed to go like this. He felt tired and exhausted just from all the talking and he didn't want Mikan to ask anymore tough question. But if what he'd been thinking was true then he wouldn't have much time left to take everything in slowly one by one. He knew it too well that peace had never been his company. Fuck his life. He had to ask. "Persona, how many times has he come here?"

Mikan looked surprised. "How do you know about that?"

"Actually, after what I've done a week ago it's quite surprising I can still wake up in the hospital." Yeah, he thought he'd be in an underground cell somewhere when he opened his eyes. "And me, in here for a week, there's no way Persona could wait that long to give me my punishments. I figured he must've come quite often to check if I had regained my consciousness."

"You're right." Mikan looked grim. "He came right after you just had your surgery and wanted to take you away, but the doctors were strictly against it as they said you could die if you weren't under any medical supervision at least until you're awake and Narumi-sensei helped too so Persona had no choice but to leave. He checked on you almost every day after that. But that was all."

"I see." It's not that he's ungrateful but this was way too quiet. Something's definitely off. It seemed weird that Persona and the ESP hadn't done anything for a whole week and just quietly waited for him to wake up from coma without causing any commotion after he broke into his office and even stole his Alice stone. _Well, except that they already had_.—Natsume thought grimly. "That shadow freak." He mumbled. "Where is he?"

"What?" Oh, you mean Tsubasa-senpai." Mikan looked away from Natsume, practically searching her brain to come up with an answer. "Em…well, he, uh…" She trailed off. "Y-you know what Natsume? I really think you should rest right now. Your body's still tired right? You shouldn't be thinking about anything else but your health for now." She put on her usual smile, but clearly Natsume wasn't going to be fooled by that.

"No, stop avoiding my question Mikan." Yes he called her name because he wanted her to know that he's serious about this. "Tell me what happened to him."

Mikan tried to avoid any eye contact with Natsume and kept her mouth shut but it didn't last long when she heard him calling her by her name once again. "I'm sorry but I can't tell you anything yet. Please understand, Natsume. I just don't want you to worry about this while you're still recovering. And it's not like there's anything we can do about it either so…" She blabbered.

So something did happen. Mikan was never good at keeping secrets, he knew it. He just needed to push her a little bit further. "Just tell me. I'll be more worried and restless if you don't because then I won't stop wondering about what has happened to that guy." He couldn't believe he just stated himself to be worried over someone; what's more that someone was the Shadow freak. Either way, it seemed to work because Mikan was looking at him with a rather hesitant face. "And you know that I have my own way to find out, if not from you then from someone else. In fact, I won't hesitate to jump off this bed any moment now for that. So why don't we keep this simple and you just tell me about everything now."

"Well, I guess you have a point there." She said, her stubbornness gave way. "It's not like I plan to keep this from you for long. But are you sure you really want to know _now_?"

Natsume rolled his eyes and sent her _the look._

"Right, I'm sorry." She apologized. "It's just…I just still can't believe Tsubasa-senpai is part of the Dangerous Ability Class too. All this time he just kept smiling without ever mentioning anything about it. And the worst, everybody seemed to already know but me! But none of you had ever bothered to tell me either. I was mad when I found out but then I realized that all of you must be keeping this a secret because you didn't want me to worry. But by the time I learned the truth, it's already too late." Mikan's brows knitted together. "He, Tsubasa-senpai, they took him away the same day you had your surgery. After knowing he couldn't do anything to you for the meantime, Persona went straight to his room and decided to take it all on him."

"What do you mean?" Natsume's heart was pounding.

"I don't know about the details. But Misaki-senpai told me a few days later Tsubasa-senpai came back to his room looking…looking literally half-dead." Mikan's voice began to falter. "Bruises and…fresh wounds covered his entire body and he had broken arms and leg. There were three star marks under his left eye instead of one, and they seemed to cause him so much pain even after he was taken to the hospital, and the doctors couldn't do anything about it because they said those were a curse caused by someone's Alice and the only one that could stop it was the person who put those marks on him." Natsume gritted his teeth. It was definitely Rui. So they used Rui's Alice on him as one of his punishments, and reminder of course.

"Two days later he was summoned to the principal's office again. Even though we all told him not to go, Tsubasa-senpai insisted that he had to or else they'd do the same thing to Misaki-senpai." Well that definitely sounded familiar. "So after all they've done to him he went back there all by himself." He wouldn't say what that shadow guy did was stupid even just in his mind, because that was exactly him all these years, desperately running around the same old circle to one man's amusement. It was the repercussion of loving someone, a price they were willing to pay in exchange of that person's safety. Instead he listened quietly while wondering what kind of tortures they did to him this time. But what he heard next really knocked him down with a feather. "An hour later Tsubasa-senpai returned to the hospital again, precisely he came to this room to see you. He was okay, though. No new wounds or anything but his eyes were empty. He didn't reply to anything I asked him. But that night he gathered all of us, Misaki-senpai, Narumi-sensei, Subaru-senpai and also Tono-senpai in here to…" Mikan inhaled deeply. "To say goodbye to us."

"What?" Natsume looked utterly confused, unable to understand what she meant by that.

"The principal assigned a new mission to him." Mikan tentatively continued. "Not just that, but it's also a limitless one. So as long as he still hasn't accomplished it he's not allowed to ever set foot in this Academy again."

"What mission?" Natsume stiffened. This turned out worse than he thought.

Mikan looked hesitated once again. She bit her lower lip nervously. "Well, they wanted him to return what he and you had stolen, the Stealing Alice stone, back to the principal. And since the stone has totally lost its power, they said the only way to fix this was by going after the owner of the stone itself. His mission was to find Yuka Azumi and capture her alive, then bring her back to the Elementary School Principal."

Natsume's eyes widened as the shocking revelation hit him. He said nothing but inside his head was a complete mess. _Fuck. Fuck all of them! What were they thinking? Do they want him dead? For God's sake, it'll still be difficult even with the whole Dangerous Ability combined together, but assigning such mission to an inexperienced student all by himself … they're sending him straight into a minefield! We barely made it out alive the last time we chased after Yuka. That woman is beyond dangerous. It'll only be a matter of time before the worst happens, and Shadow must've known about it too. But why did he still accept it? _Natsume swallowed. _Of course. The price of disobedience, even without them stating it, was clear as this daunting hell that he's dragged into, and it's my entire mistake. If I were more persistent to prevent him from coming with me, this wouldn't have happened. Shit. I'm tired of all this. Have I ever done something right for once that didn't end up badly? Taking the blame for my sister and they sent me to this hell. Sparing innocent children from my fire and I got beaten the shit out of me. And now, the attempt to save my friend has made me lose another. What a life!_

"Natsume? Natsume!"

"What?" He snapped from his train of thoughts, but still a bit in daze.

"Are you okay? You look very pale."

"I'm fine." Natsume said, ignoring the headache he's starting to feel. "When did he leave?"

"Yesterday. Tsubasa-senpai wanted to wait until you wake up but Persona demanded him to leave as soon as possible. So he asked me to tell you when you're awake that he's sorry because you got shot for protecting him, and everything that happened to him wasn't your fault. He didn't regret helping you at all. He even jokingly said not to miss him after he left, and above all he wanted you to… to keep protecting me." Mikan's tears had welled up in her eyes at this point. Didn't want Natsume to see her crying face she had been trying to hold it since earlier. She thought she had no more to shed after all the crying she did yesterday but the realization that what had happened to her Senpai might also happen to Natsume freaked her so much she couldn't keep her emotion at bay any longer. Now that he's awake, his punishments were the first waiting in line. What if Persona also decided to take him away from her and made them never be able to see each other again?

"Polka, hey…" Natsume tried to calm her. Despite Tsubasa telling him all that happened wasn't his fault, Mikan's crying only made him feel guiltier about it. "Don't cry. He's not dead isn't he? If you're like this everybody will think you just attended his funeral. That guy might be an idiot but he'll definitely come back here." He was partly trying to convince himself with those words. No. He's definitely going to make sure Tsubasa come back alive from his mission, no matter what it takes.

Mikan shook her head. "It's not that…" She said in a tiny voice that Natsume had to strain his ears to catch.

"No? I thought you're sad because—"

"Yes! And no." She covered her face with both hands. "I'm sad because Tsubasa-senpai has to leave. But these tears… there's something…" She stammered between sobs, making it harder for Natsume to understand. "Please… just… don't leave me too Natsume."

He didn't know why but those words coming out from Mikan's mouth worked like magic to him. Suddenly every puzzle in his mind seemed to fall to the right place. The diffusing warmth overwhelmed him in a strange way that in that moment he found himself having the strength to lift his body up from the bed and embrace the girl standing in front of him. Mikan gasped slightly in surprise but Natsume wouldn't let go of his arms. He locked her tightly with his remaining strength despite his left side was burning in pain. Then to his surprise he felt Mikan's hands around his back, returning his hug with just as much emotions. He closed his eyes. They both savored each other's touch, no one spoke or was willing to let go.

Mikan knew she wouldn't be able to stop the principal from doing whatever he wanted with Natsume so at least for now, she wanted to be with him. Just like Tsubasa-senpai, she didn't want to have any regret for not being true to her own feelings. Her Senpai did confess his feeling to Misaki-senpai before he left the Academy, and it gave her the courage to do the same thing. She's in love with Natsume, and she wanted him to know that before it's too late. And it seemed there's no other perfect moment to say it except now.

"Natsume…I…" Mikan paused when suddenly Natsume's warm breath touched her neck and it sent chills down her spine, making her blushed fiercely. "Natsume—" Controlling herself from shaking, she tried to continue what she was about to say. It certainly wasn't easy, but Mikan managed to gather up her courage once again. She breathed deeply and finally was ready to say it. "Natsume, I lo—" She stopped. _Wait. Is it just me or his body's leaning heavier against me? _She realized Natsume was panting and soon the first cough rang through the room, viciously tearing the silence of that engaging moment.

"Oh, no. Natsume!"

He coughed again. And again. And again. And it was becoming harder each time. He slipped from Mikan's arms and doubled over, propping his upper body on the bed using his right arm while the other hand clamped over his mouth, trying to stop himself from coughing his guts out. His pale face turned red from the strain. It didn't stop there. The real shock came when Mikan spotted some blood on Natsume's palm.

"Is that blood?"

Natsume instinctively trying to hide his hand but he knew it was no use anymore. The damage's already done. Mikan had seen it.

"Have you been coughing up blood all this time?" Mikan said disbelievingly. "How bad your condition actually is Natsume?"

He shook his head helplessly. The lump that clogged up his throat was choking, making him unable to speak and he couldn't get it out no matter how many times he coughed. All the effort was beyond draining and exhausting to him. Seeing how critical Natsume's condition was Mikan abruptly went over to the headboard and pressed the nurse call button to get help before she went back only to witness him spitting out more blood from his mouth. She began to freak out but fortunately a nurse entered the room and approached them.

"What happened?" The nurse asked.

"I don't know." Mikan answered frantically. "One second he was fine but the next he began coughing up blood."

The nurse moved closer to check on Natsume but he quickly brushed her hands aside and spoke to Mikan instead. "Where's…my stone?"

Understanding what Natsume meant, she pulled open the top drawer and took out the Healing Alice stone that was previously given to her by a nurse along with Natsume's other belongings. The stone had lost its power when she received it but luckily she had asked Tsubaru-senpai to refill it once again with his healing Alice. She handed the stone to Natsume who then clutched it tightly until his cough had subsided then he slumped back into the bed exhaustedly, covering his eyes with his right arm.

"Are you feeling better now, Mr. Hyuuga?" The nurse asked after no more cough was heard.

Natsume was about to say that he felt like shit but he realized Mikan was still there, anxiously waiting for his answer. "Yes." He forced the word out before swallowing the remaining blood in his mouth back into his throat. The copper tang was always sickening every time.

"I'll be sure to inform this to the doctor." She said while readjusting the flow rate of the IV, slowing it down probably? Then she shifted her gaze to Mikan. "And I'm sorry, Miss. I may have to ask you to leave for now so the patient can get a proper rest."

"Em, yeah, sure." Actually Mikan didn't want to leave. She didn't want to let Natsume out of her sight even for just a second. The nurse somehow saw the hesitation in her eyes and she put on a reassuring smile at her. "Don't worry. We'll be here to help him if anything happens. I ensure you your boyfriend is in good hands."

"Thank…What?!" When the word 'boyfriend' registered in her mind Mikan blushed again. "She's not my—"

"Shut it, Polka." Natsume cut in. He lifted his arm to look at her. "She's right. You're too noisy in here."

"Hey!" She protested. "I'll leave okay? So you better rest well. I'll be back again after class." Before she walked out, she glanced over him for the last time. "Promise me you won't go anywhere until I return."

"It's not like I can walk even if I want to." Natsume replied. He knew it was Persona she was worried about. He himself hopefully prayed with all his luck that the man would somehow be too busy to check on him today.

* * *

Half of the day after Mikan had left went quite peaceful, actually. No chest pains or coughing up blood, no distraction from anyone coming inside his room, and even no sign of Persona at all that he found himself almost doze off for a few times, or maybe he already had every time he thought only a couple minutes had passed but when he looked at the clock he realized half an hour had gone by.

He had been thinking about Tsubasa. Rather than blaming himself, he was trying to find a way to make Kuonji revoked his mission and let him return to the Academy in one piece. He met a dead end. Even if he put his life on the line there's no guarantee they wouldn't send Tsubasa again after he's gone. And the proposal would certainly be rejected because they clearly wanted him alive since he'd be more useful to them that way. Ironically if he's dead they couldn't care less either, just like throwing an old rusty toy to a garbage bin. At this point, nothing he had in him could work as a bargaining chip in his favor since they've already owned him basically. His life, his future, and they even tried to control his feelings by threatening him when they thought his eyes weren't as wild as they used to be, as fierce as how the Black Cat should be. It was one of those moments when he felt so defeated and lost and he hated himself for he could do nothing but submissively obeying their orders. He needed to find another way.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door being opened and there came in the same doctor who examined him this morning when he's just awoken. He held a green folder in his hands and was walking towards him. "Good afternoon, Mr. Hyuuga. How are you feeling? I heard from the nurse that you coughed up some blood earlier this morning."

At first he scowled at the disruption but then absently answered. "Not bad. I've been through worse." He was scrutinizing the doctor. The man's quite young, probably in his early thirties. He didn't notice before but then he realized he had never seen him and it was strange since he thought he knew at least the face of all the medical staff in the Academy's hospital and they all knew him of course. He must be new.

"Ah, yes. Hemoptysis isn't unexpected at this stage of your disease. I presume you're quite used to it by now." His eyes glinted with sympathy. "But it's not the only reason I came here." He grabbed a chair and swiveled it around facing him before taking his seat. Great. It was never good when a doctor did that. He had a feeling this was going to be a long talk. "I guess I haven't introduced myself. My name is Dr. Amazaki and I'm the physician in charge of your surgery. I know you're Dr. Kurosawa's patient but since he was transferred into another hospital a week ago I came here as his replacement. I've read your medical records Mr. Hyuuga and I'm…quite astonished by what I found." He broke his gaze to read the paper. "You were admitted here 28 times over the past year and more than fifty percent of it wasn't just because of minor injuries. It also doesn't include the regular checkup you did every month." Dr. Amazaki looked up again to see his patient's reaction, probably hoping some sort of denial to the fact he stated. Natsume just shrugged. Was it really that many? He never bothered to count before.

Dr. Amazaki returned to his papers. "Anyway, the reason I came here is because your blood test has come out, though I must say I'm not very pleased with the results. But let's start from the good news. About the gunshot penetrating injury to your abdomen, the operation last week went quite well. You're lucky because even though the bullet lodged in your peritoneal cavity it missed the important abdominal organs. No serious injury to the tissue surrounding the wound track either so you can say the damage is quite minimal. With the help of the Healing Alice you'll be healing even faster. In two days from now you may barely feel any pain at the incision site. Just be sure to always keep the sutures clean and dry and avoid any physical activities that might re-open the wound."

"And the bad news?" Natsume said in a flat tone.

"Well," He paused momentarily. "Unfortunately it seems that the continuous overuse of your Alice has pushed you over to the next stage of Alice disease. From the late intermediate now you've progressed into the early advanced stage."

Despite knowing all along his Alice was a ticking time bomb to him Natsume was still slightly shaken up by the news. He had expected this to happen sooner or later but hearing the dreaded diagnosis spoken earnestly to his face still managed to land a blow on him. Nonetheless he said nothing and let the doctor continue. "At this stage, all your organs are acutely inflamed thus we can't do much to reverse the damage inflicted by your own Alice with the Healing Alice. This is critical because if left untreated in a couple months the prolonged pain might make you unable to do daily activities. But you don't have to worry. We can still suppress the pain as well as delaying the inevitable with other methods. I'll continue the anti-inflammatory medications and inhaler that Dr. Kurosawa prescribed to you for your COPD but I will have to add theophylline along with a bronchodilator to your medications since your lungs isn't getting any better. And because your D-dimer level is high I'd like to order more tests to determine whether there are any dangerous blood clots that traveled to your lungs which can lead to Pulmonary Embolism. Though the surgery you just went through can also be the cause, the early detection of the underlying problem is still important in order to get you the effective treatments immediately.

Also, I'll add more daily supplements for you because the diuretic you've been taking for high blood pressure is lowering your potassium and magnesium levels. I presume you experienced abnormally fast heartbeat more frequent lately?" Natsume nodded through gritted teeth. "Psychological stress, lack of sleep, or straining physical activities can easily trigger your arrhythmia. I'm sure Dr. Kurosawa has explained to you before that frequent episodes of SVT may weaken your cardiac muscles and lead to heart failure, especially when you have other co-existing medical conditions. For now I recommend you to start eating heart-healthy diet, reducing stress and getting plenty of rest as these simple actions can greatly influence your health. But if your cardiovascular disease worsens in a few weeks from now I'll have no other choice but to give you a calcium channel blocker while having your blood pressure and lungs monitored regularly. The drugs will ease the pain in your chest but there are other side effects to look forward to such as lightheadedness, swelling of feet, ankles and legs as well as bleeding of the gums and sexual dysfunction. Of course there's a chance to prevent that if you take all of your medications regularly and change into a healthier lifestyle. You won't feel as much pain and even get better overtime. Also if you stop using your Alice at all I'm sure you'll recover—"

"Nonsense." Natsume muttered when he felt he couldn't handle more.

"I'm sorry?" Dr. Amazaki looked bewildered.

Natsume sucked in his breath. Apparently this new doctor had no idea that such thing as 'stop using your Alice' was an impossible task for him. "Look. Let's stop pretending like there's still hope for me. Both you and I know this isn't a curable disease, not throughout the entire history of Alices with the fourth-form. We're damned from the beginning. No matter what I do or how many medicines I take I'll still die in the end, isn't that right?"

"Of course not." The doctor answered like he'd been practicing the words through the years of his career facing a patient like him but Natsume managed to catch a glimpse of hesitation in his eyes. "I mean, we can't say for sure. But as long as there's still something we can do—"

"Just tell me when." He cut off, wanting to end this availing talk. "How many times do I have left?"

Dr. Amazaki's expression grew quiet. It was unpredictable of this question to come out from a twelve-year-old boy's mouth. He stared at his patient for a long time as if deciding whether it'd be wise to spill the bitter truth to him. Mostly people tend to avoid this kind of talk. They wanted to believe they could still be saved and it was part of a doctor's job to make sure the patient wouldn't lose their hopes. But this time it was not hard to tell that despite his young age this patient would prefer to hear the truth in all its asperity. For a boy his age to be hospitalized more than 28 times within a year, he must've gone through a lot, probably more than he could imagine. His attitude clearly showed it. He's not going to back off until he'd given him the answer to his question, even though it's not the one he wanted to hear. But he deserved to know.

So the doctor closed the chart containing Natsume's medical record he had in his hands and took off his glasses while heaving a sigh. "Providing you stop overexerting yourself and stick to all the treatments given to you, you'll have two more years to live."


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Hi everyone. I hope you're all doing well wherever you are. I'm sorry it took me such a long time to update the chapter since this story was already on the road of abandonment before. I'd like to thanks MKBianca for reminding me that I've ever written such a story and because of his/her words of encouragement makes me able to once again continue where I left off, so this chapter is for you **

**CHAPTER 9**

Natsume leaned back against the bed, resting his head on a pillow and staring vacantly at the hospital's white ceiling. All his senses were still dulled from the drugs that Dr. Amazaki had insisted to be administered into his body right before he left, which he claimed have the effects of calming down his tensed muscles as well as antidepressant medications for relieving his anxiety and stress which once again he arbitrarily decided must be what his patient was feeling right then after hearing such dreaded news. He had told him that they would not give up on treating him for as long as he's still breathing, that the predictions and verdicts in all; however accurate the data and technologies they might have, could still be proven wrong in the end. It actually happened in some cases where for example a child who had been diagnosed with the late stage of small-round-cell-tumor, one of the very rare and aggressive types of cancer which led all the doctors to believe in the same conclusion that he would not survive past the age of ten, but it turned out he's still well and alive on his thirtieth, the cancer had miraculously disappeared from his body. And so on he went to other inspirational, hopeful encouraging stories which almost made Natsume's eardrums bleed had he not threaten to burn the doctor with his Alice if he plan to stay any second longer inside his room.

Nevertheless the threat aimed at him, his final advice as a good doctor was to remind Natsume once again to try not to use his Alice under any circumstances from now on. If he kept overusing his power, he's afraid, there would only be less than a year left for him to live and all the effort of curing him would just go down the drain. He seemed to not understand why a simple thing such as that is being stubbornly neglected by his patient. He definitely wanted to live; otherwise his body wouldn't fight so hard to wake up from that comma but the face he immediately made when he advised him about the only way to prolong his life tells him that it was something more impossible than trying to reach the sun without getting burned. Dr. Amazaki sighed. However, he had no other reason for being inside here any longer and he had done everything he could as a doctor so he decided to leave his patient to rest and sort his thoughts for now.

Once the doctor has left, Natsume found himself able to breathe again. He carefully placed his hand on top of his bullet wound that was almost completely closed by now and rubbed it gently. His body might be numb but it didn't stop his mind from racing inside his head, mulling over the fact that his death is soon approaching. This time it would be real. No comma, no episodes that would end up with him waking up in the hospital. One day his heart would just suddenly give up on him and stop beating and that would be it. From the first time he knew what kind of Alice he owned he'd known this day would come and he has been learning to cope with the fact his whole life that he tried to reassure himself that there's completely no need for the exaggeration. Human dies and it's something normal in life. A law of nature that nobody could defy. A thought even flashed inside his deepest mind that maybe with this he could finally meet with his mother. He always wanted to get to know what kind of person she was since there's not much memories of her he could remember. Now, he'd finally get the chance.

But then again, if he's totally fine with death why's his whole body trembling so hard right now?

It wasn't the cold; the room temperature was a little too warm in fact. Was it fear? Being trained as an assassin with power over others, he almost feared nothing in his life. He once concerned about the safety of his sister but Aoi's with their father now, living her normal life as an ordinary kid with no Alice. He was glad they managed to get her out because of her status as a non-alice user, otherwise she'd still be stuck in here with him. By reaching that goal and seeing her smile for one last time, he should've nothing to be afraid of anymore.

That left the only thing that could explain the tightness inside his chess, the one holding him down was none other than his love for Mikan. What would become of her if he's gone? She would definitely cry a river for him even though he's not the person she loved and that was what hurting him the most. If only she hadn't been so kind to anybody, if only she chose to neglect and stay away from him that day, it all wouldn't come to this, would it? But now she's become the most important person in his life and just like how she didn't want to lose him, neither did he. He wished for her happiness from the deepest of his heart but in the end he's going to be the one to take it all away from her. Isn't it just too cruel?

If only they had met under different circumstances, different life and not as Alices, would they already be happy together? Natsume had dreamt about that countless times in his dreams, but alas none of those were real. The two of them being together, he couldn't make it real. And now it would never be. Mikan would definitely not forgive him for giving up this easily so in that moment he decided it'd be best not to tell her anything about this, even if she'd eventually figure it out in the end. At least until the time comes he could still see her smiling face. His goal of protecting her with everything he's got still hasn't changed either and for that he desperately needs his Alice. Not using his power ever again was never an option for him in the first place as long as there're still people wanting to hurt her. He didn't care if nobody understand his sacrifice which they certainly wouldn't so like always, for everybody's sake he need to keep his confirmed death line a secret.

The drugs had almost knocked him out when he sensed the presence of someone entering the door into his room. He had no idea how long time has passed since Dr. Amazaki left him alone but he assumed that school must already be over for the day.

"Mikan?" Natsume muttered with half-closed eyelids, his mind still clouded.

He heard a faint chuckle. "You must still be dreaming if you thought I was that girlfriend of yours, my little cat."

Hearing the very familiar voice immediately made his hair stand on end. The last vestiges of sleep fading and his tiredness flew away, Natsume jerked instantly from his bed, swiveled around and stood bolt upright facing the man. His sudden movement yanked the IV tube out of his left hand and blood started dripping out from the open wound on his palm but he was too on edge to notice. "Persona…" He gritted his teeth.

"It seems my precious pet has returned from the world of the unconscious. Don't you miss me?"

Natsume glared up at him. His hands balled into fists, struggling for control at the sight of the last person he wanted to see in his current state, though he knew exactly what he came here for. He came here for his punishment. His mind shuddered at the thought but his body resolutely refused to give away the slightest sign of fear for the masked teacher's eyes to catch. No matter how shattered he was on the inside he would never give him the satisfaction of seeing his weakness.

Persona stepped closer to him, the sounds of his heels echoing throughout the room. He stopped barely a feet in front of his bed. "It seems that you don't, but no matter." He bent his head slightly forward and wrapped his fingers around Natsume's neck, brushing it slightly with his sharp nails. "But you know, there's someone else who does miss you a lot. In fact, since the first day you lay unconscious on that bed he's been waiting for the time to finally meet you in person again. Now that you're fully awake, I trust that you will not make him wait any longer will you, Natsume?" Persona whispered in his ear, his cold voice bone-piercing.

Natsume's brows knitted and he felt cold sweat beaded down his clammy forehead. His knuckles turned white but he didn't twitch. But before he was able to open his mouth in the next second Persona had grabbed him by his collar and roughly pulled his body down to the floor. Amid the shock, Natsume lost his balance and almost tumbled awkwardly forward but then Persona shifted his hold to his other arm and that saved him from hitting his head hard on the ground. Without so much as a breathe he began dragging the boy harshly out of the room and passed the empty corridor of the Academy's hospital with him still barefooted and he couldn't care less about that. The only thing he cared about was getting the boy to the Elementary School Principal as soon as possible for he had spent long enough coming back and forth this place in the last week just to check on him. He was beyond pissed because of the trouble they caused a week ago.

Natsume felt the pain from being tugged on so hard and mostly he was being dragged around along the way rather than walking with his own feet because it was impossible to keep up with Persona's fast pace with his still-recovering body, and even knowing that Persona still did it on purpose to torment him. When they reached the emergency exit to avoid any suspecting eyes Natsume couldn't take it anymore and he jerked his hand away from his grasp. "I can walk by myself." He growled.

In irritation, Persona reflexively lifted his right hand and swung it rapidly towards Natsume's face but stopped midway in the air when he remembered what was more important right now. The ESP was already losing his patience and he'd be in trouble if they didn't get to his office soon enough. After that, he's sure he'd get his own time to deal with the kid's impertinence so for the time being he let it slip and started walking again, cueing for him to follow his steps.

When they arrived in front of the office door Natsume was already panting. His face a bit flushed from the remaining fever and his sides began to hurt again if he moved around too much. He tried to ignore it as he heard the muffled sound coming from behind the door which was an abrupt response to Persona's knock, asking their identity. "It's me, Serio. I brought Natsume Hyuuga along as you requested." There was a brief silence before the voice told them to come inside.

Natsume's stomach tied in knots as Persona opened the door and he stepped inside the room, dreading for what's to come because he knew exactly what that would be. He averted his gaze to avoid the owner of the room's sharp gaze directed at him by looking around the place that he broke into only a few days ago which seemed like a long time already, noticing the new wallpapers and furniture replacing the ones he had damaged to make sure no trace left of the incident that happened previously. The only thing different was the flush steel door leading to the secret compartment wasn't hidden with bookshelf anymore. Some part of it was still charred and Natsume took in the satisfaction knowing he was the one who had caused that to the Principal's precious Alice stone room. Guess a mechanism like that wasn't easy to fix just in a couple of days.

"Natsume…Hyuuga, the Black Cat…" The Elementary School Principal spelled out his name slowly in the most menacing way as he stood up and rounded his work desk to come face to face with him. Persona stepped to the side as he came closer and Natsume could feel the intense atmosphere lingering inside the room as he was forced to look at the man straight in the eyes. "Finally…" From the outside, the Principal looked almost the same age as him but Natsume knew the man was actually way older than his child-like appearance. Apparently something, or someone caused his body to shrink and his time reversed so he couldn't return to his original look. And he also knew he's been so desperate to find a way to lift the curse which Natsume hoped, would never happen.

The Principal's black eyes glared at him, and without warning, he punched Natsume hard in the face, knocking him to the floor. Pain seared through Natsume's burning cheek and he felt blood forming out on the edge of his lips, but the ESP wasn't done yet. Without letting him to recover, he went over him and started kicking his body viciously, not caring about hitting any of his wounds. Natsume tried to dodge the relentless attacks directed at him but it enraged the Principal even more and he beat him harder. Natsume's head spinning as he felt the wound on his side opened but he let out no sound when the ESP grabbed him around the neck and slammed his back against the nearest wall. "You ungrateful brat!" He held him by his throat, his face filled with rage. "Give me back my Alice stone, you thief!" He put pressure on his fingers and Natsume started to choke. "I took care of the incident your family caused back in that little town. I spared you from the wraths of the people whose houses burnt by your sister. I trained you here and make you stronger, but you! You and your pathetic little friends have to go against me in every possible way!" He punched him again, then releasing his hand to let Natsume's frail body slid down the wall.

Natsume coughed, his mouth opened trying to breathe in more air into his lungs and he moaned painfully as the effort worsened the agony inside his chest. His whole body throbbing but the worst was his left side. He didn't need to look to know that it has started bleeding again. It wasn't as life threatening as before but he still felt bad for all the effort the doctor had put to stitched it close before which was now in vain thanks to Kuonji. But even with the feeling of disoriented he wiped the blood from his mouth and his burning crimson orbs leveled the Principal's stare. He looked at him in complete disgust. "You killed my mother…" He clenched his fists so hard he thought they'd crack. "You took my sister and imprisoned her for years, and you turned me into a killing machine to do all your dirty works so you have _no right_ to say anything like that to me. I owe you and this hell of a place completely nothing!"

The ESP's glare intensified then he mercilessly stepped on Natsume's body, hitting his ribs and earning a cry of pain from him. He smiled seeing the boy suffer. "Don't you know how worthless you are Natsume? To all of them out there, your existence is only a nuisance tainting their society. Nobody wants you. They fear your presence, and your power makes you a monster in their eyes. They could never accept you, no place would accept a dangerous Alice like you except me. I took you in and put you into a good use, the only way to utilize that destructive power of yours is by turning you into a weapon. As my weapon you will kill under my orders because that's the only thing you're good at. If only you stayed being the emotionless assassin that you were before that Yuka's child came, none of this would ever happen! I will make sure to punish every single one of them helping you to get that stone, just like that shadow-manipulator." He threatened.

The Principal crouched down to reach for his hair and pulled it roughly, forcing him to look into his eyes. Natsume struggled in his hold but finding himself too weak to fight back. He had to do everything to restrain himself from using his Alice on this man because first of all he knew he has a strong barrier surrounding him which was imposssible for his power to penetrate in this weakened state and lastly his friend could be in danger too if he acts recklessly. "Now," He snarled. "You're going to tell me the names of all the people involved in last week's incident, including the ones telling you about the whereabouts of Yuka's Alice stone in my office and helped you planned out the whole thing."

Natsume snorted, swallowing the blood inside his mouth in the process. "Do you think I'll just talk? Aren't you the one who always tells us to never give away any information regarding our mission to the enemies no matter what?"

His face turned into a full eerie smirk. "As I expected…" He let go of him and stood up. "Persona!" The masked teacher who had been watching silently from the corner of the room moved quickly towards them and handed something from his hand to the ESP who took it eagerly then shifted his attention back to Natsume who was now lying feebly on the floor. "Let's see if this will change your mind." He said as he lifted the thing that looked like a pearly white stone with one hand. The stone started to glow dimly.

Instantaneously, an immense wave of pain struck Natsume's whole body. It felt as if thousands of needles ruthlessly pierced him over and over and his insides were burning. He gasped and writhed around in agony, curling up his body trying to block out the pain. He squeezed his eyes shut, desperately trying to hold on to himself through the invisible force that was brutally ripping its way into his body, tearing all his limbs apart in a hundred different directions. By the time the pain finally subsided he was barely aware of his surrounding anymore, but his ears could still vaguely catch the voice coming from his tormentor's mouth.

"Does it hurt, Natsume?" He sneered. "This alice stone contains a very powerful pain Alice. It means I can keep inflicting pain to your body with this stone for as long as I like. No matter how strong you are, you're still human and you ought to have some limits. You'll eventually have to give up and I'll make you confess sooner or later. But if you want you can easily save yourself from more misery and start telling me what I want to know."

He waited for his response but Natsume only disregard him. He figured the ESP must have already asked the same question when interogating Tsubasa but seeing how he still demand an answer from him must mean that he didn't get what he want the last time. And if that Shadow Freak still managed to persevere and keep his mouth shut even after being beaten so badly, then so would he.

"Do you still not want to talk? Fine, I'll let you have a taste of this stone's power once more."

Natsume braced himself as the dull pain inside his body began to intensified and racing through his every muscle, and he almost cry out because of that but managed to bit his lower lip to prevent himself from doing so. He couldn't think and could barely even breathe as the intense agony cut through him. It was becoming more and more unbearable with each passing minutes but then just as soon as it had come all of a sudden the feeling's all gone, leaving his body trembling and shaking involuntarily.

"Names!" The ESP shouted in his ears.

"..."

"As you wish then."He mercilessly activated the alice stone again, and again, and again untill there was barely any power left within. Once it drained all out, he threw it across the room but Natsume was also already on the brink of unconsciousness. He breathed heavily, struggling not to faint. The Principal grabbed him by his collar. "Just because you refuse to tell me do you think I do not know it was Kazumi Yukihara who's behind all this? The only reason why I'm still wasting my time with you is because I just need to hear his name spoken directly from your mouth to earn the legitimate proof that he has stepped over his boundary and violated our agreement. Yes, that man's been quite a bother to me for some time and I've been waiting for the chance to finally stripped him off of his position as a principal. You were a good valuable pet of mine before Natsume so I'm giving you one more chance. Say. The. Name."

"...go to hell..." Natsume managed to say between breath.

Infuriated, the principal punched the last light out of him as he growled out in frustration. "Useless."

"Principal..." Persona gave him a small handkerchief which he used to wipe off Natsume's blood from his knuckles.

"Get him out of my sight." He ordered.

"Are you just going to release him? What about his punishment?"

After some time letting his anger simmered down he let his glance slid again towards the unconscious boy. "No. I just received words from the hospital and it appears that our Black Cat here doesn't have much time left anymore. His own Alice will soon kill him and that alone is enough to serve as his punishment." He brushed strands of hair away from his face. "But instead of letting his power go to waste, I'm thinking of making it as useful as possible while we still can. I'll have Natsume Hyuuga do his last mission soon enough."

* * *

Mikan stayed a bit late in class to finish the cleaning duty for it was her turn to do the job that day. Actually she wasn't up for it as she kept worrying about Natsume but she couldn't just leave all the work to her friends so she decided to stay, mopping the floor absentmindedly with slumped shoulders and a frown etched deeply across her face. Alongside her was Anna and Koko who were tasked to clean the windows but they couldn't concentrate either as they noticed their usual cheery friend suddenly turned all gloomy and looking depressed.

"I thought the sky would collapse sooner before Mikan started making that kind of face." Koko commented with his signature smile plastered on his face.

"Hmm, there must be something really troubling her right now." Anna agreed. "She even turned down Nonoko's offer straight away when she asked her if she wanted to go to Central Town and get some Howalons after school. I wonder what she's thinking that makes her frown like that. Can't you read her thoughts Koko?"

"Nuh-uh. It seems that she's getting better at using her Nulification. Usually I could still hear a few words slipping out of her mind when she's not aware but right now she's really keeping her guard up. I couldn't get a thing." He tapped his head with his finger. "Hey, isn't she your friend? Why don't you just ask her what's wrong?"

"She wouldn't tell us." Anna sighed. "She didn't even tell Hotaru and that's why she's so pissed off earlier."

"Ah, that's why she hit Kitsuneme harder than usual today." Koko paled remembering what the Ice Queen did to his friend just now in class only for commenting on her hair. "Anyway, at this rate I don't think Mikan will be anywhere near finish with her work even by dinner time so I say we better help her then we can all go back."

" 're right." They put back their equipments in the locker and started heading towards Mikan.

"Mikan-chan, are you okay?" Anna asked.

"Ah?" Mikan woke up from her daze. "Anna-chan. Yes, yes of course. Why wouldn't I be?" She faked a smile but the two friends, having to known her for years were easily able to see past her facade.

"If you're feeling unwell you can just go back to the dorm and leave the rest to us, y' know?" Koko said casually, resting both hands behind his head.

"I'm not—" Mikan stopped. She realized that she has made her friends worry, but as much as she wanted to she couldn't tell them about Natsume because of their promise. She even tried so hard to keep Koko from peeking into her mind this whole day which was tiring she thought she couldn't keep it any longer. Besides, Natsume must also be waiting for her right now so maybe it would be better for her to leave after all before they started asking more questions and making her accidentally spill the beans. "Actually, yes. I'm feeling a bit sick. I think I better go back to the dorm and get some rest. I'm sorry but do you guys mind helping me out finishing my job just this time?" She put her hands flat together in front of her face, begging.

"Don't worry about it, Mikan-chan. Of course we'll do it for you." Anna smiled sheepishly.

"Yeah."

"Thanks a lot Anna-chan, Koko." She hugged them. "I'll treat you guys with Howalons next time." She waved them goodbye and took off but instead of going back to her own dorm, she went straight to the Hospital building. However when she got there unexpectedly Natsume's room was empty. His bed was cold and there's no trace of him anywhere in sight. Mikan momentarily panicked and ran outside to look for any nurse nearby. "Excuse me, do you know where's the patient that has been staying in this room?"

The nurse glanced up to check on the room's number. "Ah, do you mean Mr. Hyuuga? Well, actually he's been missing from his room since two hours ago. We've tried to look for him everywhere but it seems that he's not in this building anymore."

"What?" Mikan was shocked. Where could an injured person like him has gone? He's not even supposed to move around too much yet. But what if Persona has come while she's still in class and take Natsume away? Mikan's mind was racing in fear as she thought about the most likely scenario and she quickly turned around to begin searching for him.

"Wait, Miss." The nurse stopped her right before she made her leave.

"Huh?"

She abruptly went inside the room and came out again a few seconds later bringing a white plastic bag in her hands. "This is all Natsume Hyuuga's belongings as well as some important medicines he's suppose to take regularly to speed up his recovery. All the instructions were already inside so can you please give it to him once you find Mr. Hyuuga?"

"Sure." Mikan carefully held the plastic bag the nurse handed to her. She bowed down respectfully and thanking her for the information before she started walking to the opposite direction. It didn't take long for her to break into a run as she wondered about the most possible places where Natsume could be right now and she decided the first one she would check on was his room back in the Elementary dorm building.

Mikan was huffing and puffing by the time she got to the hallway where all the special star rooms were located. Even though the weather outside was cold, it couldn't stop her from sweating abundantly as she dashed all her way there without even catching a break. But she was glad when she finally made it to the front of Natsume's room. She found the door opened slightly which was weird because she was sure it was locked before and it got her hopes up that Natsume might really be inside. However she thought it would be rude to just barge in like that and she was about to knock but stopped just in time when she heard faint voices of people conversing inside.

"...and that's all of it. That's all the details of your upcoming mission." Mikan gasped inaudibly when she realized it was Persona's voice. What was he doing inside Natsume's room? "You better... carefully... He ordered you to leave... end of... week." She was having a hard time catching a few words so Mikan took a bold decision to lean in more closely and strained her ears to listen through the crack. "I guess that's enough time for you to recover and regain your strength to be fit enough to do the job right?"

_Job? Does he mean mission?_

"Are you kidding me?" This time Mikan recognized the voice to be Natsume's. "This is suicide. Does he really want to get rid of me that bad?"

"Of course he wants you to succeed more than anything else. But if in some ways the situation goes down the hill and calls for an ineluctable sacrifice, then it can't be helped either." Unlike his interlocutor, Persona was speaking in a startlingly calm and deliberate manner. "After all, you've little to no value anymore in his eyes."

"So after making me live through this nightmare for four years now he's just going to dispose of me like a broken toy." Natsume's voice was quivering, like he's trying to restrain himself from lashing out.

"Don't get so full of yourself, boy. You were never that important to us in the first place. We can easily replace you with many others after this."

There was an unpleasant silence in the room before somebody spoke again. "What if I refuse to go?"

"I think you already know better than I do the consequence to that foolish act."

Natsume wearily heaved a sigh. "Is this the same place where you sent Tsubasa?"

"Hmm, who knows. Each of your goals are different but there's a chance you might meet him along the way." Persona chuckled evilly.

"Asshole."

"You can say whatever makes you feel better Natsume. I'm going to pretend not to hear it this time." His voice got lower so Mikan had to take another step closer inside the room as she didn't want to miss out on anything. "After all, there's no use listening to the ravings of a dying person."

_Huh? Did he just say—_At first Mikan thought she has misheard it when Persona was saying somehing about someone dying, but his next words made it clear.

"Even if we don't send you on this mission you're still going to die anyway. With that heart of yours that could stop beating at any moment now we might as well make your death worthwhile, don't you agree Natsume?"

Mikan's eyes widened at the shocking revelation of the truth.

_Natsume...Natsume's going to die?_

**A/N : Don't forget to review guys. And thank you for all who still haven't forgotten this story even though it's been such a long time.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Mikan's eyes widened at the shocking revelation of the truth.

_Natsume...Natsume's going to die?_

Mikan felt a sudden coldness hit her in the gut as she couldn't believe what she just heard. Her heart began to pound and she unconsciously placed her shaking hand over her mouth as the suffocating feeling of dread starting to overwhelm her. No. It can't be real. Natsume has just returned to them from his near-death experience during the last week and now that he's awake everything's supposed to be alright already. She thought that the worst has passed and now they'd be able to return to normal life again as students with all their friends in class B but how could Persona say something so cruel like that?

Mikan clenched her chest tightly. Her mind refused to acknowledge it but it was her heart betraying her as deep down she's truthfully aware of how Natsume's condition has worsened lately. Even without the previous incident affecting him his health was already a constant source of worry and it has been falling rapidly through the last few months. He looked tired all the time and with the intense coughing he's been experiencing almost every night, the bottom line was almost frighteningly obvious. But she was so scared she didn't want to believe that was the only option they have. There's got to be something—

"Looks like we have a visitor."

Mikan suddenly realized that she has been too occupied with her thoughts that she didn't notice the over looming shadows right in front of her. She glanced up to see Persona himself standing in the doorway. "Ah." She gasped and stepped away, terrified of what the teacher would do now that she has been red-handedly caught to be eavesdropping on their conversation. She watched as Persona's hand reached to the door frame and he pushed it open wider to reveal more of her petite figure so that even the occupant of the room could see her clearly now.

"Mikan?" Came the voice from behind Persona.

Mikan tilted her head slightly to see Natsume who was sitting on his bed with half of his body covered in blanket looking at her with a startled look on his face. There were conspicuous looking bruises on his cheeks that were impossible for anyone to miss. "Natsume!" With all the questions in her head at the moment Mikan wanted nothing more than to run straight to the boy, but she couldn't with Persona still standing in her way. However when she returned her gaze to him he smirked knowingly and instead of snapping at her he merely walked past her, making his exit and leaving only the two of them in the room.

Mikan took the chance and quickly scrambled to Natsume's side, carefully taking in his appearance while doing so. He was currently wearing a long black turtle-neck sweater that hid most of his skin except his face which she'd never seen him put on before, and that got Mikan the feeling those horrible big bruises on his face were not even the worst of his injuries. "Natsume, what happened to you?" She kneeled down beside the bed to level his eyes but he already turned his face away to the opposite direction. "Your face... Was it Persona who did all that?" Her voice quivering a bit.

Natsume acted as if he hadn't heard her and kept the attitude for a long while until Mikan pressed on. "Natsume, please." Mikan took notice of his abnormally pale complexion underneath the awful blue and dark purple colors decorating his now rather swollen cheeks and realized how hurt it must be. She felt herself partly to blame for that as she should've never left his side at all back in the hospital.

Natsume shook his head slightly. "No." He slowly drawn up his knees and folded his arms around closely, hunching over in an almost fetal position. His long bangs falling over covering his crimson eyes. "It's nothing. Just leave me alone for now Mikan."

"How can it be nothing?" Mikan's eyes began to glisten. "Do you know that it also hurt me every time I see you like this? It feels so suffocating inside every time you shut me out and decided to stay quiet about the most important matters, even now. Don't you have the slightest trust in me after all we've been through together?"

Mikan stared down at the non-existent spot on the floor. Her fingers reached the hem of her skirt and clenching it with shaking fists, bracing herself for the next words to come out. "I... I heard what Persona said to you." She paused, waiting to see if she's earned herself a reaction from the said boy but he stayed in his statue-like stillness. "What he said about... about you're dying... It isn't true is it? Please tell me it isn't true." Her eyes were deep, chocolate pools when she returned her gaze to him, a look of anguish crossed over her face.

"Why aren't you saying anything?" Her lips trembling as she saw his unwavering eyes, which beyond its burning colors held such an interminable pain and dejection he had endured. "You don't even once look at me ever since I came in here." The silence he's been so obstinately displaying almost drove her crazy. She couldn't wait any longer and reached for his hand, gripping it firmly in her hold hoping to finally get his attention. "Talk to me Natsume."

Mikan managed to catch the flashing in Natsume's eyes for a brief second before they unexpectedly flared into burning temper. "I said leave me alone!" He snapped, jerking her hand away from his and the force sent Mikan's body crashing to the floor.

"Oww!" Mikan moaned in pain while rubbing her aching back but Natsume only stared down at her coldly. She yelled to him in agitation. "Why are you—"

"You've been so noisy since earlier." His piercing gaze and indifferent tone of voice abruptly cut her off. "What do you care? Whatever happens to me is none of your business."

"What's wrong with you?" Mikan's eyebrows furrowed as she noticed the sudden change in his expression. It was completely void of any emotion before which she thought couldn't get any worse but now his face filled with resentment and his darkened eyes were unforgiving, just like how they were when he first met him. So vicious and horrifying. This was not the Natsume that she knew, and she couldn't help but to shudder under his scrutiny.

"You seem to have the wrong idea about me." He slid a sideways glance that seared her, making her body icily cold.

"Just because I said nothing and let you hang around me all this time, you actually think that we're close enough you can just talk all you want about me. Well, I'll set this straight for you. The truth is, I can't stand your presence at all. The mere sight of you disgusts me and my hatred towards you hasn't changed since I first saw you in that faculty office. To me, you're nothing but a stupid loud-mouthed ugly girl who doesn't even know when to stop meddling into other people's business. I've had enough of your nagging." He rose to his feet and his intense gaze overlooking her small figure before he heartlessly delivered his final blow. "I hate you, Mikan. I don't want to see your face ever again from now."

"Wha—" Her voice trailed off as the feelings of dejection and hurt welled up inside. Mikan's eyes were burning with threatening tears as Natsume's harsh words kept repeating itself over and over again in her head. The fresh wound he had just inflicted on her was extremely painful for the reason it had come from the very person she loved, who she thought also loved him back, or at least consider her more than just a nobody but he had stated it that he hated her every being and his words were clear as day that there was hardly any room for Mikan to retaliate or even interpreting it in different ways.

It's like she had been punched straight in the gut, forcing every bit of air out of her lungs and left to choke up on her own despair. She didn't know what to say at the moment, or even how to react because all she wanted was to disappear from the room, to escape the penetrating crimson eyes watching her every movement. She felt so ashamed she didn't want to be seen crumbling and breaking for him more than this so in order to save herself, she aimed for the much more productive emotion; anger.

"Natsume…you jerk." Her voice cracked as she tried to hold back the tears. She slowly got up, her knees wobbling but she was too busy picking herself up, or at least make an impression of not hurting in front of him. "I…I hate you too." There was a twinge in her chest when she said that but she forced herself as she had no other choice. "I don't want to know anything about you anymore!" She threw the bag she had been holding right at him, quickly turned around and ran away from there just in time before fresh tears starting to roll down her cheeks.

Natsume moved his eyes following Mikan's hurried retreating figure quietly while also taking notice of her fragile shaking back. He stood on his ground for a little more while and after making sure she'd left his room far enough, his strength ultimately gave way and he slumped listlessly to the ground with the bed frames supporting his body.

He sat on the floor holding his head in his hands and sighed deeply, overwhelmed by a horrible sense of guilt and indignation which gnawed at his insides for everything he had said, for everything she had to hear because he never actually meant any of them. He loathed himself more and more with each passing insult coming out of his mouth that he ruthlessly directed to her, and the look of hurt he saw in her eyes; so raw and familiar, clawed his own wounds and caused a pang of regret that crushed him so thoroughly he could neither breathe nor move.

He slowly looked down to his hands, recalling the devastating desire of wanting to embrace her that came like a boisterous flood as soon as he saw the expression she made. The kind he hated the most to be etched across her face. At that moment he badly wished to use those hands to shield her from every hurt, ease her worry by saying everything's going to be alright, but he didn't. He couldn't.

He was exhausted; physically, mentally and emotionally with all the compulsory pretense done for nothing else but her own sake, to spare herself from further grief of losing the man she loved because she had already known she was about to, so wouldn't it be better if he make her to as well hate him? Then maybe in the end the pain won't be too excruciating, the slice won't cut too deep and the stitches that will be made by everyone who also greatly cherished her, the faithful friends who will do everything to fill the hole in her heart after he's gone could be enough for her to move on and find somebody else, a kind-hearted man that will surely return all her feelings and make sure she never hurt again, possibly someone like Ruka. Yeah, he could trust Mikan to his best friend. She'd be fine; they'd be fine without him. It didn't even matter anymore if he has to be alone drawing the last of his breath. With the mission that was just assigned to him, at least he already knew exactly the hows and whens of his finish line, and he'd already determined to die fighting.

"She cried." Persona emerged from behind the still-opened door, the black clad he's donning had done a great job concealing his presence impeccably during their conversation though Natsume was completely aware he was there the whole time. He leaned casually against the jamb with arms crossed over his chest. "Weren't you a little too harsh on her?" He asked in a form of teasing.

"Look who's talking." Natsume replied coldly without sparring him a glance.

Persona chuckled derisively at his remark but stayed where he was, watching the boy with jeering amusement.

"She's gone." Wearing his emotionless mask, Natsume opened his mouth when he still sensed the teacher's presence. "There's nothing more for you to see in here. If you have no other business with me, get out of my room."

He laughed. "Of course. Now that the little show you put on is over I have no reason to stay here any longer anyway." The smirk grew on his face before he turned on his heel. As he closed the door behind him he looked over his shoulder one more time and said. "Rest well, my cat. I hope to see you soon in class."

* * *

It wasn't until the fourth day of locking himself inside his room that Natsume found the strength to actually get up from the bed and decided to end his peaceful seclusion by going to school that Monday morning. He noticed that he had lost some weight which was hardly surprising considering the amount of food he had taken during the last few days. Most of his time was spent lying quietly on the bed, staring numbly at the ceiling. With the absence of light inside that hollow empty room, many thoughts had come and gone from his mind but in the end it was always the scene of his last conversation with Mikan that would hauntingly, persistently return to him in his every waking breath. And the more frequent nightmares at night weren't any help either so he finally decided he'd had enough and instead of continuing to hide like a coward, he would get back to his feet and face the harsh reality once again.

When he arrived at the class the first one to greet him enthusiastically was Ruka. Natsume was relief to see his friend in a perfectly good shape now contrary to when he last saw him two weeks ago. The Alice stone did such a good job and it looked like he was already back to his usual self that it was as if the accident had never happened. Though he was a bit perplexed when Ruka suddenly asked how his mission went and why it took so long for him to come back before he remembered the excused they all had agreed upon to cover up his absence. He came up with another lies to align with the previous ones—something he seemed to have done too often lately, leaving out the details as usual and his words just flowed smoothly there's no way anyone hearing him would not believe it.

He was about to get to the part of explaining the injuries on his legs when the class' door suddenly opened and from behind it came a genial voice he could instantly recognize at any place. "Good morning, everyone." Mikan greeted the whole class.

"Morning, Mikan-chan."

"Good Morning."

She smiled at them in reply but anyone who knows her could immediately tell it wasn't the usual bright hearty smile that had become her trademark as the brunette has been looking low-spirited these past few days. The entire class noticed the peculiarity but they had no idea what could be the reason for her sluggishness. Even her pigtails looked somewhat lusterless. Nonetheless she walked around the class heading to her own seat which of course, had to be located right behind Ruka and Natsume's desk. She stopped abruptly when she spotted the raven-haired boy.

In that moment they were caught into looking at each other's eyes.

Mikan's filled with uncertainty and at the same time anguish for his betrayal, while Natsume kept his ever-present poker face though it wavered for a second and glinted with unrefined feelings of remorse and profound sorrow which he immediately pushed to the back of his conscience before Mikan could notice and he was the first one to break their contact by turning his face away from her. Facing the rejection, Mikan's hands curled up into balls at her sides and she looked like she was about to cry.

Ruka noticed the tense between them and he went from petting his pet rabbit to stand up on his feet and facing the brunette. "Sakura?"

"Ah." She blinked rapidly to clear her vision. "M-morning, Ruka-pyon." She said dismally and stared downcast to the ground hiding her face then hastily head over her desk without waiting for a reply and sit beside Hotaru who's currently busy finishing her latest invention.

Hotaru stopped working on her tool when she saw her. "Mikan?" Mikan didn't seem to hear Hotaru as her mind had flown somewhere else. However the wordless exchange between her friend and the Black Cat just now didn't go unnoticed by the inventor's keen eyes and they straight away ranged over the bemused Ruka who also had no clue to what was going on between them. She gave him a silent glare that told him to figure out what's the problem with his best friend as she held the newest collection of Ruka's humiliating photos in her hands as the means of blackmail if he didn't do it soon and that was enough to send the animal-lover scrambled back to his seat to ask the said person.

He began nervously, clearing his throat. "Ehm, it seems that Sakura has been acting weird ever since I recovered and went back to school a couple days ago." He said. "Do you perhaps know something about it Natsume?"

He shrugged and frowned. "How am I suppose to know what's inside that stupid brain of hers?"

"But just now it seems that…"

"Let it go Ruka. I'm not talking about this." He propped up his feet on the table and placed a comic book he brought to cover up his face. "Just so you know, I don't want anything to do with that girl ever again." With that he cut off their conversation one-sidedly by pretending to sleep so Ruka couldn't confront him with the matter any further. As expected he heard him sigh but subsequently said nothing else.

As the time went by, the act had almost become genuine until five minutes later when Narumi's sudden entrance surprised the whole class by noisily blowing a golden trumpet with festively attached red ribbon to it that Natsume also couldn't help but wake up from his slumber. Begrudgingly he opened his eyes to see their homeroom teacher's appearance that was even weirder than usual. He was wearing an elf costume with long jingled hat, leather shorts over long-sleeved shirt, striped socks and even pointy curled up shoes, all in bright reds and greens which was a contrast to his blonde hair that he felt staring at it for too long could cause a permanent damage to his eyes.

Narumi beamed his brightest, biggest smile to them. "Good morning! How are my cute little students doing?" He said in a sing-song tune. "Well, I hope you're all doing well since there's only two more weeks left before Christmas!" Some students immediately cheered at his words while Narumi blew his trumpet once again for the sake of celebration until Natsume almost really burn the Goddamn thing. The teacher clapped his hands and the tumult died down.

"Because of that, starting from today you're all going to help with the preparation of our annual Christmas Party in the Alice Academy Grand Hall. As usual you're going to be split into two groups where each will be responsible for either decoration or food and start working together after school based on which team you choose. I hope you all pick wisely by carefully considering where your Alice will be able to give the better contribution while not forgetting to have fun too when you're at it. That being said, I'll leave it to Inchou to list down the team preferences of each student in class B and submit it to the event committee before lunch." He gestured to Tobita who sat at the front and nodded briskly.

"Is there any question?" Narumi asked. Having to celebrate the same party every year in the Academy all of the students already knew what to expect by now and thus it left none of them with question. Narumi took the clue of their silence then speak again. "Well, if you don't then I'll be seeing you after school because I'm giving you all a free period today, so Adieu!" With that he twirled out of class to who knows where, leaving the students who were already busy chattering with each other while the Class Rep began to carry out his duty starting from the backmost desk.

Natsume closed his jaded eyes once again when the teacher's gone, drowning out all noises around him of people talking about how excited they were for Christmas or wondering what they would get as presents this year which vexed him more by each passing seconds, knowing extremely well he wouldn't even last until the much-awaited day, let alone welcome it with celebration like all the other students. It had been irrevocably decided without his consent that he must leave three days prior to Christmas at the latest so the occasion definitely had nothing to do with him, and he wouldn't want to be bothered with things such as preparations or the appendages–anything that smelled festive, when there're much more important subjects he had to think about. So when Tobita Yuu meekly approached him only because he had to after he's done with everyone else except him and Ruka, Natsume bluntly turned down the bespectacled boy. "I'm not participating." He said uncaringly.

"Eeehh?" His face grew frantic. "But Natsume-kun. Narumi-sensei clearly said that every student has to take part in this and haven't you always been previously?"

"Tell him to count me out this year." Came his curt reply.

"I can't. You know I'll be in trouble if I don't get this form filled out by lunch." The ever-dutiful Class Rep adjusted his glasses anxiously, pleading to the Black Cat. "Please, Natsume-kun. You don't always have to show up after school but please help me and just pick any team for now." He pulled on a lost puppy looks which affect him not even the slightest. But Ruka heard all that, and kind that he was, starting to get sympathetic.

"Tobita's right Natsume." Ruka began to speak next to him. "Unlike any other events the Academy held, this Christmas Party is the only one where even Dangerous Ability students are allowed to participate. Because of your status you've missed out pretty much on everything that it's a shame if you have to skip this one too. Besides, it's our last Christmas before we graduate from elementary school. I want you to at least have a little fun before that."

Tobita immediately looked up to Ruka with sparkling eyes and an extremely grateful expression like he's some kind of angel while Natsume sighed wearily. How the heck was he supposed to have fun when he knew he'd be spending Christmas exactly six feet under grounds surrounded by other dead people? He might as well reserve a coffin and decorate it from now to make it merrier for the occasion. Maybe then he would feel less lonely, or cold. Could dead people even feel at all? Guess he would find out the answer to that before long.

Above all, he couldn't allow Ruka or his other friends to know about it. Mikan had known but thankfully it seemed she hasn't told anybody. He had to keep up the charade and in this case sticking to his point would only get as far as protecting his already-bruised ego. Besides the act would later require him an acceptable, if not realistic explanation to his best friend which he couldn't provide any right now. He mentally cursed the universe for putting him in this situation then leaned back on his chair to hear the girls talking.

"So how is it, Mikan-chan? Which team are you on?" It was the pink-haired girl, Anna.

"Well," said Mikan. "Since my Alice won't be of any use for decorating, I thought I should choose the food team just like last year." She tried to be excited like how everyone expects her to, but to Natsume's ears the unnatural way she raised the pitch of her voice only made her sounded like a choking duck. He grimaced inside at Mikan's awful lying ability but lucky for her it seemed that the duo geeks were completely blind to that.

"Really? Nonoko and I are also on the food team." Anna giggled excitedly.

"What about you, Hotaru-chan?"

"Sure." The inventor replied. Her face was composed but her eyes twinkled meaningfully. "I'll be glad to provide my assistance when it comes to the food tasting."

"We're all on the same group then! I'm sure we'll have so much fun." The other girl squealed.

Natsume decided he'd heard enough and shifted back his attention to the two boys in front of him. "Oi." he called the Class Rep.

"Yes, Natsume-kun?"

"You can write my name on that paper." He said nonchalantly.

"Really?" Tobita blurted out unbelievingly making Natsume narrowed his eyes at the stupid unnecessary question. "I-I mean, of course. I'll put you on the food team as usual then."

"No." He muttered quietly. "I'll be on the decor team this year."

**A/N: I'm sorry if this chapter is a bit short but please don't forget to review. ;)**


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